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IMS to serve as COVID drive-through vaccination site
In an effort to be helpful to the state of Indiana and city of Indianapolis in getting more Hoosiers vaccinated against COVID 19, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway will be serving as a site for the distribution of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine supply.
If everything goes to plan, the shots will be provided between March 5-7, and the good news – people won't even have to get out of their car.
"We made it clear to the state and local officials that if there was any way the track could be useful in combating the pandemic, we were all in," Miles told RACER.com on Monday night. "It made sense to use the Speedway because we can facilitate a lot of people in an orderly and expedient fashion. We're not sure how many doses we will receive, but there are three J&J vaccine locations in northern, southern and central Indiana and we're the central one."
The Speedway will feature a drive-through service for the J&J vaccine and use the Formula 1 garages. People will then be directed to the parking lots in Turn 1 to wait for the 10-15 minute clearance time and then drive back out to West 16th Street. IMS officials are hopeful of getting as many fans as safely possible into the May 30 classic.
It's believed NASCAR tracks in Texas, North Carolina and New Hampshire are also planning something similar to IMS, which is open to providing the vaccine at other times in March and April depending on the supply.
This story has been updated to clarify the dates for the vaccination program.
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Robin Miller
Robin Miller flunked out of Ball State after two quarters, but got a job stooging for Jim Hurtubise at the 1968 Indianapolis 500 when Herk's was the last roadster to ever make the race. He got hired at The Indianapolis Star a month later and talked his way into the sports department, where he began covering USAC and IndyCar racing. He got fired at The Star for being anti-Tony George, but ESPN hired him to write and do RPM2Nite. Then he went to SPEED and worked on WIND TUNNEL and SPEED REPORT. He started at RACER when SPEED folded, and went on to write for RACER.com and RACER magazine while also working for NBCSN on IndyCar telecasts.
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