Indy 500: Explain the tradition of why winners drink milk in the Victory Circle

The winner of the next 109th Indianapolis 500 will receive an ice -cold bottle of milk in the winning circle on Sunday on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

But why milk? When did the tradition began?

The origin of tradition was in 1936 when Louis Meyer was sitting on his car after winning his third Indy 500 and had a bottle of buttermilk in his left hand.

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The team Penske driver Josef Newgarden drinks on the victory podium after winning the 108th Indianapolis 500 on the Indianapolis Motor Speedway on May 26, 2024. (IMagn)

But tradition started with an accident. Meyer drinks the milk post-chief.

“It was a hot day. I came to the garage area … and everything I could think about was a nice, cold buttermilk,” said Meyer, according to the Indianapoli Motor Speedway website.

Meyer grew up in Yonkers, New York, and his mother told him that buttermilk would refresh him on a warm day. After a strenuous race, Meyer wanted to have the drink he had grown up: buttermilk.

The milk was stuck because Meyer’s moment was caught by a cameraman with the milk. A manager in the dairy industry saw the film material from Meyer and demanded that each winner of the Indianapolis were handed over 500 milk.

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Milk bottles for the 2025 Indy 500 are signed by the drivers Devlin Defrancesco, Louis Foster and Felix Rosenqvist while shipping the famous blue envelopes with tickets for the Indianapolis 500 on March 12, 2025. (IMagn)

Every winner from 1938 to 1941 and after the race the break due to the Second World War in 1946 in the winning group took a break.

However, there was a time when milk was not the drink of winners. Wilbur Shaw, who won the Indy 500 in 1937, 1939 and 1940, became President of the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and carried out some changes.

From 1947 to 1954 the winners of the legendary race received cold water in a silver chalice. However, the tradition did not last when Shaw died in a plane crash in 1954, and the milk returned in 1956.

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The team Penske driver Josef Newgarden drinks his milk after winning the Indy 500 on May 26, 2024. (IMagn)

But the milk returned as an accessory price because winners were offered 400 US dollars for drinking the milk.

Since then, 69 consecutive winners of the race and 76 overall winner have enjoyed milk in the winning group.

The Indy 500 will be broadcast on Fox with cover from 10 a.m. on May 25th. It will also be available Stream live on foxsports.com And the Fox Sports app.

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