INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — Every month, WISH-TV highlights a local school district with “The Morning Bell,” a conversation focused on new or exciting programs and accomplishments within Indiana schools.

On Monday, the Speedway High School Band joined Daybreak to discuss their role in the Indianapolis 500. The band is the only high school group to march ahead of the race at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and every year in The AES 500 Festival Parade. 

Students Jackson Hopkins and Cayden Goodman are both seniors and help lead the band.

“We actually march all the way there and then we escort the trophy along with the Gordon Pipers and then join up with the Purdue Marching Band and march down that straight away in the front,” Hopkins said as he described the band’s role on race day.

When asked what the experience is like to be a part of the Greatest Spectacle in racing, Goodman said, “It’s crazy – seeing now – because I’m in the front conducting versus being in the back for the flutes. So, just seeing both perspectives of it, it’s just crazy to be a part.”

The students spend all year preparing to perform in both the parade and at IMS on race day.

“Every day during class for an hour, we go marching around the school campus and then around the returning neighborhoods,” Hopkins said. “And then after school twice a week, we have an hour to hour and a half long practice marching along with that, too.”

The students say there is an adrenaline rush to marching ahead of the Indy 500.

“Especially like walking in, through and underneath tunnel with the drum line playing and everything, the whole sound is booming into the stadium,” Hopkins said.

“It gives you chills just walking through,” Goodman added.

Listen to the interview in the video above to hear the band perform.

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