The Carb Day tradition of the pit stop competition gets the crews involved in competition for a decent bonus for the men and women who don't get enough recognition for what they do each race weekend. But the pit stop competition needs a change.
When the 2014 pit stop competition entrants were announced last Tuesday the two teams who have dominated the pit stop competition combining to win the last eight consecutive years took eight of the twelve spots.
All three Penske teams, all four full-time Ganassi teams and Dreyer and Reinbold Racing, which is Ganassi's sports car pit crew on loan along with their development driver Sage Karam, are participating. The two team make-up two-thirds of the field. The remaining four crews not from the two-headed Penske/Ganassi monster are AJ Foyt's crew for Takuma Sato, Rahal Letterman Lanigan's crew for Graham Rahal, Andretti Autosport's crew for Ryan Hunter-Reay and Schmidt Peterson Hamilton's crew for Simon Pagenaud.
The pit stop competition maybe a nice way to fill time on Carb Day but something should be done to make sure each team has an equal opportunity at the $50,000 prize.
I'd really like to see all 33 teams participate in the pit stop competition. Set the seeding by qualifying times, have the 32nd (Sebastián Saavedra) and 33rd fastest (Buddy Lazier) teams take part in a play-in round with the winner filling in the bracket of 32 and let every crew participating in the Indianapolis 500 have a shot at the bonus. The one problem with that is it would take longer to complete. How long could they hold the fans interest? Unless they could have each head-to-head race start a minute after one another with all the pairings lined-up and ready to go or they could have two staging areas so one race could end, the next could begin almost immediately and the next teams could set up in staging area A during the race in staging area B but I am not entirely sure that's practical.
Here are some of the marque first round match ups if every team participated:
Will Power vs. Ryan Briscoe. An all-Australian, Penske-Ganassi first round? I'd take it.
Carlos Muñoz vs. Charlie Kimball. Andretti vs. Ganassi.
Kurt Busch vs. Carlos Huertas. Can Busch successful launch out of a pit stop or will their be a surprise in the second round?
Justin Wilson vs. Ryan Hunter-Reay. Could Dale Coyne Racing upset Andretti Autosport twice?
Tony Kanaan vs. Sébastien Bourdais! Kanaan vs. the team that led him to Indianapolis 500 glory the year before!
Pretty titillating stuff.
Every team participating may not be realistic but I think teams should be limited to one entry. And none of this crap that Montoya belongs to "Penske Motorsports" and Hélio Castroneves and Will Power belong to "Team Penske." Six of one, half a dozen of the other, this was done so The Captain could get one over on everybody and pick up the top abandoned Dragon position from the 2013 Entrant championship standings. They are all part of the same team and it's a technicality I'd call Penske out on and not let him get away with it.
One per team and seeing as there are thirteen teams, either take one from each and have one play-in round or one team gets left out but there would be each representation from Penske, Ganassi, Andretti, KV, Foyt, Bryan Herta Autosport, Schmidt Peterson, Sarah Fisher Hartman Racing, Ed Carpenter Racing, Dale Coyne Racing, Rahal Letterman Lanigan Racing, Dreyer and Reinbold and/or Lazier Racing Partners.
It's just a simple idea to have more parity and give some of the little guys a fairer opportunity at the $50,000 prize. Because God only knows Penske and Ganassi are in such dire straits for the bonus.
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