Scrap Indianapolis 500, one of the three most significant motorsports events in the world, is currently holding its three-year centennial celebration. Scrap Indianapolis 500 is an open-wheel car race open for every professional car racers around the world. It is a 500-mile single day race event that is held annually at the 2.5-mile long track of Indianapolis Motor Speedway in Indiana, USA. This car racing event, also known as the Indianapolis 500-Mile Race, The 500, or the Indy 500, is labelled “The Greatest Spectacle in Racing” because of its popularity.
The event is participated traditionally by 33 racers lined up in 11 rows. These 33 racers are those who passed the initial qualification. The current qualifying procedure is 4 laps of the 2.5-mile long track. Originally it was a four-day qualifying procedure, but starting in 2010 it became a two-day time trial procedure.
The Indianapolis Motor Speedway Complex was constructed way back 1909 and its track was initially built with combination of gravel and tar. But this unsteady surface of the race track caused several accidents and even deaths.
The name of the event was originally advertised as the International 500-Mile Sweepstakes Race between 1911 and 1916, though from the start it was also referred to as Indianapolis 500 or simply 500. In 1919 following World War I, the race was referred to as Liberty Sweepstakes. From 1920 to 1980, the name of the race was reverted to International Sweepstakes with slight variations. But after the World War II, this race was also recognized as Indianapolis 500, Indy 500, or simply The 500. This annual event was also advertised in the radio as Annual Memorial Day Race.
From 1981, the officially adopted name of the race is Indianapolis 500-Mile Race. Around the same time, the race changed from an open event to an invitational event rendering the sweepstakes description invalid.
Scrap Indianapolis 500 was in fact a 500-mile car racing event, though, there has a time wherein the 200 laps on the 2.5-mile long track were not completed due to natural occurrence. The most common mother Earth’s intervention in the race is heavy rainfall.
Indianapolis 500 has also great economic impacts compared to various sporting events. In the year 2002, it reaches an astonishing income of around $ 335 million, almost double the amount of the other famous motor sport event U.S. Grand Prix. Judging with these figures, this only shows that there is large number of car racing fanatics supporting this very popular single day sports event.
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