This Sunday marks the 100th running of the Indy 500 at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, and to commemorate the event, Firestone has produced a special tire. Firestone announced this version of the Firehawk racing tire back on February 19th of this year, at the 100-day mark prior to the Indy 500.

The special edition tire has bright red sidewall markings of the brand-name and logo,  as well as every driver’s name who has won the 500 using Firestone tires. In all, that number stands at 66 spanning back to Ray Harroun in the first 500 in 1911 and up to the current champion Juan Pablo Montoya in 2015. The tire’s visual design is visually refined by the inclusion of red “F-shield” logos at 90 degree offsets to the red Firestone name, and the 100th Running logo created by the Speedway to commemorate the century mark. The winners’ names are listed in chronological order from Harroun forward, along the sidewall in high-contrast white ink and stand out from the black sidewalls with great definition.

It’s this kind of thing that makes me love graphic design. Yes I know this is a splendid piece of promotional marketing, but in the end someone had to design this. A graphic designer, and an art director for sure.  Probably a committee had some say in the final executed result. It doesn’t matter how we got here, its the fact that someone thought about this little detail, and executed it so well. I can’t wait to see every car lined up wearing these shoes tomorrow.