Annual bike race full of traditions, history; raises money for working student scholarships

Little 500 is more than the largest collegiate bicycle race in America. It is more than the biggest intramural event on the IU campus. It is more than a great college weekend.
Little 500 is the event that turns men and women into riders and IU students into Hoosiers.

According to the IU Student Foundation’s Web site, the Little 500 is the biggest intramural event at IU. It is also the largest collegiate bike race in the United States.
Every year, riders compete in four-person teams in separate races for men and women around a quarter-mile track. IUSF coordinates Little 500 every year.

More than 25,000 people attend the races each year, with the proceeds used for working student scholarships at IU. More than $35,000 was given away in scholarships in 2008.

Modeling the event after the motor race that takes place 56 miles away at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, Howdy Wilcox, then-executive director of the Indiana University Student Foundation, founded the Little 500 race in 1951, 32 years after his father won the Indianapolis 500.

Similar to the traditions of kissing the sidewalk and drinking cold milk that accompany the Indy 500, the Little 500 is full of the traditions of mounting Schwinns and crashing on Turn Three.

“I mean, it’s more than just an intramural sport,” Delta Tau Delta rider Nick Lenard said. “It’s you representing your house ... and your friends, and you’re showing what you’ve done the entire year. It’s a pretty big competition. It’s more than just a race. It’s the experience.”

Along with the experience, Alpha Omicron Pi rider Lauren Wells said Little 500 means becoming more involved on campus. 2010 marks the 60th running for the men’s race and the 23rd running for the women’s race.

“The history is cool, and it’s obviously one of the long-standing traditions here at Indiana University,” Grey Goat Cycling rider Brian Holthouse said. “For a school to participate in something that is 60 years old with alumni that have performed before you and the traditions that surround the race ... is really cool.”

Riders compete on teams of four, equipped with one student coach, an experienced coach and a mechanical team. Thirty-three greek-affiliated and independent teams qualify through trials to compete in the main race, which Holthouse said is an indescribable experience.

“You work all year and you show up and it just flies by so fast,” Holthouse said. “One minute the race has started, and then you’re already on the last 20 laps and you’re trying to figure out who’s going to make a move and when. It’s really beyond words.”
Riders typically train for the race about six days a week. Wells said training for Little 500 is like any other athlete training for their sport to prevent injuries.

Some say the riders who compete in Little 500 are nuts, but Lenard said all athletes are crazy.

“It can be pretty boring day to day,” he said. “The good athletes have to be crazy about it.”