May 12th, 2010 
T.C. There is absolutely no doubt about how important pit stops are to a race. Like I’ve said here before, a team can’t win the race on pit road, but they certainly can lose it. A perfect example of this happened last weekend at Darlington. Jeff Burton brought the field to pit road as the leader with only a few laps remaining. His crew chief, Todd Berrier, called for the crew to bolt on two tires to keep their track position, and hopefully win the race. A mistake during the pit stop though, and the subsequent penalty, killed any chance for a win and saw Burton finish eighth.
In case you missed what I’m talking about, watch the doomed pit stop here. Front tire changer Dan Blizzard struggles just a touch with his on pattern (tightening the lugnuts) and the jackman drops the jack too early. If you watch very closely, you will see that jackman Adam North is watching Blizzard like a hawk. North is waiting for him to make his normal move showing that he’s finished with the lugnuts, which signals North to drop the jack. During his on pattern, Blizzard’s body makes just a small shift in position and North takes that shift as the sign that his front changer is finished. Blizzard isn’t done though and Burton, who is leaving on the drop of the jack, runs over the air hose which results in a penalty.
The normal rule they teach guys on two tire pit stops is for the jackman to drop the jack once the tire changer is at the right headlight. That gives the changer enough time to get out of the way of the car leaving the stall. As a crew works together and becomes more familiar with each other though, those tolerances become much smaller.
Let me show you an example of a very tight two tire stop. This video is of Kyle Busch’s crew, posted to Twitter by JGR Coach Mike Lepp (@mlepp). In the video you will see front changer Nick Odell hit his fifth nut, and make just a small move to leave before jackman Jeff Fender drops the jack. Odell is well short of the right headlight. And the result is Busch leaving the stall quickly, missing Odell by only a few inches.
As you can see from the two examples, the margin for error is very small. A normal two tire stop, which the #31 CAT guys have executed to perfection hundreds of times before, goes awry. Why? The answer lies in the familiarity among the crew.
The jackman sees his changers hit lugnuts everyday. And the majority of the time, they are very good. In this case, both front guys and the jackman were part of the winning crew from the 2009 Pit Crew Challenge. We aren’t talking about amateur or inexperienced guys here. They are among the best at what they do. What can happen though, is the jackman (or any other crew member for that matter) can get lulled into a false sense of security. He’s used to seeing the same thing, over and over, from his guys. This time, a small hiccup changed the normal rhythm. Add to that a little pressure with the race on the line, and you have a small mistake that costs a team the win.
So who’s ready to be a pit crew guy?
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I could never be as agile as you guys.
I wish I could find the youtube clip of JMac’s crew member vaulting the car during pit stops. That was AMAZING.
I think pit crew folks and people who race motorcycles are in the same league of shared insanity.
It is fun to watch tho’.
*smirk*
-W
Your title should have been ‘NOT being automatic bites’. Automatic is waiting for the tire changer to actually get to the mark before dropping the jack and not, as the jackman seemed to have done, jump the start. The mark is there for a reason, better discipline – being more automatic – would have kept this from happening.
Steve: No, I had it right. The jackman was being automatic. He’s seen his front tire changer make that same move hundreds of times before, so he dropped the jack when he thought he was supposed to. They’ve done it so many times together, the drop was automatic. He didn’t jump the mark. Discipline and being automatic are not the same thing. Discipline would have dictated that the jackman wait until he knew for certain that the changer was finished. Being automatic is what bit him.
While changing tires and filling a car with fuel is the same basic task, no matter the pit stop, no two stops are ever the same. The key to being really good is to stick to the fundamentals, but always be prepared for anything and everything to go wrong. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a changer who hits a few too many lugnuts, or a tire that gets knocked away by another car.
When I saw this stop during the broadcast, my first thought was “where was the air hose supposed to be when the car moved? Was the car supposed to go under an elevated hose w/ the changer remaining on the right side? Was the gun and hose to be yanked out of the changer’s hand toward the wall by a member on the wall?” As the video shows, the changer never really ever left his knees but with his head down seems to fumble around. It is as if the jackman never intended for the changer to get back around the nose. Burton needed that one for a chance at the All Star.
Neon, I was wondering the exact same thing when I was watching the race. If the changer stays on the right side, should the hose be thrown over the hood? If so, is there a chance it might get caught up on the car on exit? Does the changer throw the gun back to the wall? Seems you would save a ton of time if everyone remained on the right side.
That video of the 18 crew gave me vertigo!
I am amazed that more guys don’t get hit on pit road.
windowlicker & Neon: The rules say the front changer needs to come back to the left, with the hose, gun, and tire. I believe the carrier could stay, if he is pulling a fender.
This article and your previous post on A and B teams provide lots of information and insight into the realities of racing. They changed how I watch the race and the pit stops. Great education! Thanks.
TC-Thanks for rules tidbit. I would find a TNI post w/ a pit rules summary fascinating.
I learned something interesting during the NASCAR HOF telecast when they showed a slow mo tire change. It was that y’all remove the impact socket off of each nut while the nut is still well down on the length of the stud (all be it rotating mightily) and relying on the “spin” to propel the nut the remaining thread length. I guess there is a fine line between too much time on the nut, resulting a clogged socket vs not enough engagement time resulting in a hung nut.
I agree they’re not the same thing. Automatic means acting on the cue and not waiting for outside input (crew chief yelling ‘drop’). But it wasn’t being automatic that bit him, it was not being disciplined and jumping the gun that cost him, I am guessing, because worried about being late, he tried to anticipate the start and got called for a false start.
To what extent might the pressure these guys are under, not just the need to shave fractions of a second off a pit stop but also the fear of losing their job to someone who can shave a fraction off a stop, have played in the jackman dropping too early?
And is this one of the situations where there is relatively little return for the risk? If in fact the flinch was the tire changer getting up, they could have saved, say, .05 of a second… probably not enough to pick up a spot off pit road… but getting it wrong cost them dearly. Should the crew chief have made sure the crew knew that smooth was better than fast?