The month of May in Indy brings hundreds of thousands of people to the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and what do the people bring? Their coolers. The Indianapolis Motor Speedway is a BYOC venue, which means that with your ticket to get in, you can also bring your cooler (as long as it’s less than 18″ x 15″ x 15″) filled with whatever food or drink you might want, need, or desire
during the most exciting 200 laps of the year. Each cooler has a distinct personality, which one are you?
THE TRADITIONALIST
This is not, by any stretch of the imagination, the traditionalist’s first time at the track. The Traditionalist prides themself, just like IMS itself, on the hearty traditions of the track, which is to say, they will be pre-ordering a Track Pack lunch from a local grocery store to pop in their cooler. Cold fried chicken, a selection of chips, a couple of waters (they aren’t idiots) and a freshly baked cookie await them when the hunger pangs hit at lap 95. Enough beer to keep things festive, a few local craft brews alongside some easy drinking domestics for good measure, and they’ll be patting themselves on the back until next year.
THE PREPARED
The cooler of The Prepared is a cooler you might like to also have tucked into the back of your car when you get stuck in an epic
snowstorm, unable to move for hours. This teetotaler’s cooler was planned in advance, and likely is now a formula after years of slogging coolers to the track year after year. Plenty of fresh, homemade deli sandwiches prepared lovingly the night before the race. A few sodas to keep things alert and enough water and Gatorade to sustain a team ultramarathon. Not only ready for battle against the heat’s impacts on one’s hydration, this cooler also boasts a leveled-up skincare regimen, with high SPF in a bottle (never a spray, so rude to use for those around you in tightly packed bleachers), and a pre-chilled cooling towel to drape across one’s shoulders when the temps are getting high but the racing is getting good.
THE HUNGOVER
This is the cooler of the wild. The risk takers. Per haps, the cooler of the naive. To say this is the cooler of The Hungover is to speak of
them in a future tense, as this cooler was not packed with intentions of moderation; no, this cooler was packed for a party. There are Jell-O shots of more flavors than you even knew Jell-O shots could be. The beverage selection is singular: cheap, domestic, ice cold, plenty of it. The food is two leftover sub sandwiches ordered the night before and tossed in the cooler just before you headed into the track, to be shared among the group. Hope you like ham and cheese! This is the cooler of the group who will ultimately abandon those sandwiches in lieu of a perfectly roasted, deeply brown, lacquered turkey leg, sold right outside the stands—which happens to pair perfectly with an ice cold beer.