Indianapolis 500 rescheduled for August 23rd with 50 percent fan capacity

Three months ago, the Indianapolis 500 was rescheduled for August 23rd. On Friday, Indianapolis Motor Speedway president J. Douglas Boles announced the race will still run that day, and the venue capacity will be limited to 50 percent attendance.

“We’re committed to running the Indy 500 on Sunday, Aug. 23 and will welcome fans to the world’s greatest racing venue. We will be limiting attendance to approximately 50 percent of venue capacity, and we are also finalizing a number of additional carefully considered health and safety measures. We’ll unveil the specific details of our comprehensive plan in the coming weeks.”

The Speedway has a permanent seating capacity of over 250,000 and infield seating raises the capacity to approximately 400,000. There is no word on what the 50 percent attendance will entail between those two figures. Regardless, that’s a huge crowd in attendance.

This news comes a day removed from Churchill Downs announcing the Kentucky Derby will run before a limited capacity of fans on September 5th. Churchill Downs has a permanent seating capacity of 52,000, with infield and other options bringing the total near 170,000.