A very early look inside the renovations of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum

INDIANAPOLIS – At first glance, all looks normal at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway Museum. Aside from a new walkway, new flagpoles, new windows and the limestone Indy car statues moving from the lawn to the front of the building, everything looks unchanged from the outside.

But after the first step inside, it’s clear that everything is changing in the IMS staple. As announced in July 2023, $89 million in renovations are set to completely revitalize the museum.

A new focus on innovative technology combined with a drive for education surrounding the boundless artifacts the IMS Museum owns means changing everything about what visitors previously knew about the venue, which opened in 1976. In fact, the construction team behind the renovations have opened up two floors of additional space without adding any extra height or width to the original structure.

IMS Museum: Planned $89 million renovation 'a complete reimagination' of IMS Museum experience

How is that possible? The tall ceilings on the main floor of the museum allowed JRA, the Cincinnati-based design firm manning the brunt of the renovations, to add a mezzanine that will provide even more space to showcase even more memorabilia from the IMS Museum archives.

Kara Kovert Pray, vice president of advancement at IMS Museum, said the construction crew “punched” a hole in the main floor to open up the basement for even more space.

While the basement of the museum was originally restricted aside from VIP tours and mostly used to store memorabilia from the archives, now the basement will serve as an additional level of the museum that will feature even more memorabilia, including a four-dimensional virtual experience of what it’s like to feel cars racing in the Indianapolis 500 drive by.

While the first floor remains the main level of the IMS Museum, it is much different than before. The Gasoline Alley showcase will still be a main portion of the level, but now the setup will serve as a walk through the 108 years of Indianapolis 500 races. The floor will change from dirt to brick to asphalt, and the cars/garage setups will progress from the cars of 1911 to present day.

The next phase of the floor will serve as the main chunk of the IMS Museum’s focus on creating educational opportunities for youth visiting the venue. In this area toward the back of the museum, there will be multiple hands-on opportunities for visitors to get a close look at the dissection of an Indy car, Firestone tires and more.

Next, visitors will be encouraged to move into the “Innovation Workshop,” as IMS Museum President Joe Hale described it. In this area, tables and chairs will be set up in case of opportunities for groups on school field trips or even those interested in classes focused on potential careers in IndyCar, meant to educate youth in a way that makes them feel more engaged than a real classroom would.

“If this can be a catalyst for some of those kids getting cool careers in this industry … experiencing it is a lot better than sitting in a classroom and being lectured,” Hale said.

As a former public school teacher in New Albany, Indiana, Hale said the IMS Museum is even in the process of hiring a Director of Education to further the organization’s push for learning opportunities.

Perhaps the main attraction from a fan’s perspective on the main floor is an immersive video board that spans from floor to ceiling, simulating the Indianapolis 500 race day experience. Visitors will be able to hear and see the opening cannon firing, the traditional flyover, the ceremonial “Start your engines” procedure and every bit of pomp and circumstance leading up to the start of the Greatest Spectacle in Racing.

Dispersed elsewhere throughout the first floor will be the iconic Borg-Warner Trophy and a handful of the 150 historic Indy cars the IMS Museum owns. Those cars will be displayed on all three levels of the museum.

To spark inspiration for these planned renovations, Hale and Kovert Pray said staff from the IMS Museum visited other museums around the United States like the Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation in Dearborn, Michigan, the Kentucky Derby Museum in Louisville and the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force in Dayton, Ohio. Hale said the IMS Museum staff believes the 80% of visitors from outside of Indiana and the 20% of those visitors from outside the United States should feel closer to the Indianapolis 500 than ever after the Museum opens again in April 2025.

Contact Kyle Smedley with comments via email at kmsmedley213@gmail.com or on X @KyleSmedley_.

This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: A very early look inside the renovations of the IMS Museum