1996 U.S. 500

1996 U.S. 500 program cover

Tony George, owner of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, formed the Indy Racing League as an alternative to CART. While the Indianapolis 500 had continued to be sanctioned by the United States Auto Club (USAC) since the formation of CART in 1979, CART teams and drivers represented the vast majority of the Indy field, and USAC had taken steps to ensure that the technical specifications for Indy did not preclude CART teams from participating. In 1996, however, following his creation of the IRL, George stipulated that 25 of the 33 starting positions at Indy would be reserved for the top 25 cars which ran events in his series. This move created potential scheduling conflicts with CART-sanctioned events.

Interpreting this policy as a lockout of CART teams, the CART board agreed to stage the U.S. 500 at an alternative venue on Memorial Day weekend, the traditional date for the Indianapolis 500. George, on the other hand, viewed the refusal of CART teams to compete for the remaining eight positions on the Indy grid as a walkout/boycott.

While the Indianapolis 500 has a history of one-off participants (teams and drivers who participate in only the single race and not in other series events), the field for the U.S. 500 were comprised almost exclusively of teams and drivers who participated in the full CART season, as CART was formed of franchises owned by the various team owners, which formed the organization in 1978. CART franchise owners were required to field teams for all races. The only extra entry was a second car for Bettenhausen Racing for Gary Bettenhausen.

• CART officially announces the inaugural running of the U.S. 500 on December 18, 1995, at a press conference in Chicago. The Indianapolis Motor Speedway immediately released a reaction expressing its disappointment of CART in what it called a "negative impact on automobile racing.[4]
• On March 4, 1996, a total of twelve corporate sponsors were announced for the U.S. 500. In addition, telephone orders through Ticketmaster began offering tickets to the event.
• On March 20, 1996, ticket sales for the event were attempted to be boosted by a "doubleheader" ticket for the U.S. 500 and the CART event at Detroit on June 9.
• Despite CART's efforts to broadcast the race on network TV, ESPN was chosen in March to air the race. In addition, instead of being able to broadcast directly against the Indianapolis 500, the event had to be scheduled for 2 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, two hours after the start at Indy. CART had attempted to lure NBC or Fox, but neither deal came through. Fox wanted to show the race in primetime, which would have flatly defeated the purpose of racing the same day as the Indy 500, and in fact would have conflicted with the broadcast of the race with that of the Coca-Cola 600 on TBS instead.
• On April 25, 1996, it was announced that the Vanderbilt Cup would be recreated and awarded to the winner of the U.S. 500.

CART scheduled what was billed as a "Special Qualifying Session" for the U.S. 500 on the weekend of May 11–12, 1996. Cold temperatures and reported snow flurries hampered the session at Michigan, although it was completed as scheduled.

The move was exclusive in that all other CART events featured qualifying the same weekend of the race. Qualifying directly conflicted with the first weekend of qualifying for the Indianapolis 500. The move effectively prevented teams potentially competing at both events from having hopes of qualifying for the pole position at both races. Jimmy Vasser had a time of 31.031 seconds and the pole. Adrian Fernandez and Bryan Herta started alongside him at the first row. Teams would return two weeks later for the race.

Drivers' Championship standings