It’s the 4th of July, the day the United States of America signed it’s Declaration of Independence, which remains, to this day, one of the most historically important documents in the world. In honour of this important day, here, in no particular order, are five can’t-miss American sporting experiences:
A Yankees Game in the Bronx
Regrettably, a visit to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx no longer means visiting the ground graced by baseball legends like Joe DiMaggio, Babe Ruth or Lou Gehrig. The old Yankee Stadium was demolished a few years ago, in favour of a new venue that at least tries to copy the charm of the old field whilst catering to corporate types, whose facilities in Old Yankee Stadium were far behind other Major League venues.
So, Yankee Stadium is the House that Jeter Built, but the Yankees, as an organisation, have done a good job memorialising some of their – and baseball’s – biggest names. Visit Monument Park, an open-air museum beyond the centre-field fence, a wonderful place to enjoy and discover the rich history of the Yankees that contains a collection of plaques, monuments and retired numbers honoring so many legends. It’s an honour unlike many others in baseball, perhaps second only (for Yankees, anyway) to being inducted into the Pro Baseball Hall of Fame.
College football at Michigan Stadium
You haven’t seen college football until you’ve see it at Michigan Stadium! The Big House, as it’s colloquially known, is America’s largest sporting venue holds more than 113,000 souls on game days each fall, and is one of the most recognisable sporting cathedrals. It helps that the tenants, the University of Michigan Wolverines, are one of the nation’s most successful Division 1 football programs.
Even in the years when the Wolverines aren’t doing that well, seeing a game up in Ann Arbor is still one of the great sports experiences you can have. Michigan takes the usual colour and tradition that’s become synonymous with college football and raises the bar. Their student section is immense, their marching band extraordinary and their pre-game ceremony is as good as anywhere else in the country.
Michigan’s century-long tussle with Ohio State brings what is simply known as The Game to the Big House once every two years, and if you’re lucky enough to be at one of these heated contests – as I was last year – it’s a day you’ll never forget.
Any Event at Madison Square Garden
The World’s Most Famous Arena is home to an NBA franchise (the Knicks), an NHL team (the Rangers) and a WNBA outfit as well, and although both the Rangers and Knicks are perennially under-achieving and a source of great frustration to their long-suffering but rusted-on fans, simply being inside Madison Square Garden to watch a sporting contest is a must-see experience in one of America’s must-see cities.
Sitting on Broadway, right in the heart of Midtown, a circular cake tin-like structure that rises above the immense Pennsylvania Station, the Garden is crammed in with more sporting (and showbiz, for that matter) tradition than you can poke a stick at.
Yes, the moniker ‘The World’s Most Famous Arena’ is a publicist’s creation, but there’s an element of truth to it. There’s been epic boxing title fights, Michael Jordan dropped 50 on the hardwood, Wayne Gretzky lit up the ice in the latter years of his career and for so many New Yorkers the memories of the Rangers memorable run to the 1994 Stanley Cup Final will not fade anytime soon.
It almost doesn’t matter what you watch at the Garden – and there are some wonderful college hockey and basketball events sandwiched around the busy schedules of the pro teams who call the Garden home – because of the tradition. Even the most ardent, perpetually-disappointed Knicks or Rangers fan will tell you that the Garden is a magical place.
The Indianapolis 500
Yes, IndyCar racing’s national popularity has slipped into the abyss since the disastrous war for the fans between the Indy Racing League and the ChampCar World Series, from which a now-unified IndyCar Series is struggling for real prominence in the face of the NASCAR juggernaut, but there’s no mistaking the importance, tradition and continuing international impact of the Indianapolis 500, held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, formerly a brick pit, each May on the Sunday before Memorial Day.
There’s nothing like seeing thirty-three cars lined up in eleven rows of three coming off the final corner and down the front straight at Indianapolis, over the symbolic yard of bricks beneath the flag stand, ready to take the green. Actually, maybe there is: the moment soon after, when those cars dice and overtake heading into a tight Turn One, with fans on both sides, a veritable canyon of humanity. It’s jaw-dropping.
Although the Speedway has never published attendance numbers, best estimates from those in the know suggest that crowds on race day are upwards of 200,000 people, including permanent seating and campers spread around the 2.5-mile superspeedway on the corner of 16th and Georgetown in Speedway, Indiana. That figure, even if it’s out by a couple of thousand, still leaves the Indy 500 as the world’s biggest single-day sporting event.
Then there’s the immense tradition and prestige of winning the Indianapolis 500. Some of racing’s biggest names have triumphed at the Speedway: American icons AJ Foyt and Mario Andretti amongst them.
High school football
I’d argue that there isn’t a more quintessentially American experience than heading out on a cool Friday night to a high school to watch a game under those bright lights, sitting on cold, uncomfortable bleachers – or standing, as most people seem to do – eating a hot dog and sipping a Coke that you bought from the canteen staffed by volunteers trying to raise some more money for their school. I’ve been a part of it three times: in Virginia, Idaho and Michigan. There’s nothing like it.
In some ways, the nation’s obsession with high school football is a little weird – these are young kids we’re talking about, with enormous pressure heaped on their young shoulders – but the idea of Friday nights on the gridiron is a part of life, and it always will be.
This is particularly so in football-mad Texas, where the acclaimed and impossibly brilliant television show Friday Night Lights wasn’t exaggerating the importance of high school football in the Lone Star State, and it’s the same up in Ohio. If anything, FNL probably undersold the rabid fascination for a bunch of young kids playing on Friday nights.
In both Texas and Ohio, it isn’t uncommon for crowds that rival the size of NFL or college attendances – 40,000 and above – to turn out to high school contests.
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