Between the Races: Mel Harder

It seems like we just put the Red Bull U.S. Grand Prix in our rear-view mirror, but the Red Bull Indianapolis GP is already right around the corner; it takes place next Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Last year’s inaugural event was a success on just about every level, despite some uncooperative weather. This one should be even bigger, though, as it occurs during the track’s centennial celebration. We checked in with IMS Sr. VP of Operations Mel Harder this morning to see how things are progressing.

RRX: How are things coming together for the race?
Mel Harder: They’re great. The timeframe’s a little bit shorter from the Brickyard 400 race to the MotoGP, so we had to do the turnaround a lot quicker, but basically we’re set up and ready. Certainly it helps with a second-year event; a lot of the big-picture items have been sorted out, and it’s just a matter of executing. The track configuration is there, and we’re ready for Kevin Schwantz to come out and run his school on Friday and Saturday, which we’re looking forward to. We’re just down to final details at this point—waiting for all the little things to happen.

Do you have good weather ordered up for the race weekend?
[Laughs] The good weather has been ordered up. It’s going to be high-70s starting Friday, and it’s going to stick the whole weekend.

This is a big year for Indianapolis Motor Speedway. What other activities has the track had to recognize the centennial celebration?
For the kick-off in May, we had a balloon festival here, where we did a balloon launch and an actual balloon race. That kind of beckons back to our history; one of our first events—beyond the [1909] motorcycle race—was a balloon event. We had thirty-three balloons—one to represent every starter in the Indy 500, and it was a really cool event. The motorcycle race is really a celebration of our 100 years. Last week on Friday was the true hundredth anniversary of Indianapolis Motor Speedway, so we had a some cake for anyone who came out to purchase tickets, which was a pretty cool promotion. We had a lot of activity on that.

Any differences from last year that fans will notice?

As far as the racetrack, everything’s very similar. They had us change some timing lines, and we made some slight modifications to some curbing—we painted some more curbs—but for the most part, the racetrack was not really an issue. As far as the rest of the event, it’s mainly the same plans that we had a year ago. The Indy Mile will be on Saturday night, XDL [stunt show] will be on Friday and Saturday night, Motorcycles on Meridian will be on Friday and Saturday night, downtown. So a lot of the same plans that we had a year ago, but I will say that we’ve enhanced a few things.

You guys recently had some structural changes that some of our readers might not be aware of. What was that about?
Yes, Jeff Belskus is our new CEO of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Corporation. [Former CEO] Tony George is a board member, along with the rest of his family—his sisters and his mother. The board and Indianapolis Motor Speedway are still committed to and invested in the three racing events that we have right now—the Indy 500, the Brickyard 400, and the Red Bull Indianapolis GP.

Well, thanks for your time. See you next week.
I look forward to it, Chris. Thank you.