Welcome to this week’s edition of the Monday Morning Pit Box! It’s a brand new Frontstretch column where we break down the crucial calls on pit lane that shaped the outcome of the race gone by, looking at it through the eyes of a crew chief (sometimes, we even look at the calls that came from race control, too).
This week, NASCAR visited Homestead-Miami Speedway for Sunday’s (Oct. 23) Dixie Vodka 400, the second race of the NASCAR Cup Series playoffs Round of 8. It was the second of three opportunities for an eligible driver to claim a golden ticket into the Championship 4 at Phoenix Raceway in two weeks’ time.
In a race where not too many cautions flew, tire strategy was king, but Lady Luck still found a way to intervene in the final stage. Sometimes, a crew chief’s decision to pit comes with impeccable timing when the caution flies right as they’re doing it.
That moment of good fortune appeared to propel Martin Truex Jr. to his first victory of a long season. Instead? It was a spin on pit road, after contact from Larson, that led to head-scratching and wondering what might have been.
Behind Larson’s comeback victory were a few crucial calls atop the pit box and in race control. Let’s look at a few of them.
Entire Race: Getting On And Off Pit Lane
While crew chiefs make decisions on top of the pit box, drivers still have to drive the car onto pit road. They need to get into their box safely and the crew needs to execute the stop at speed without incurring a penalty or leaving a loose wheel on the car.
This weekend at Homestead, those mistakes seemed to trump strategy several times, knocking out multiple potential contenders for Larson. Drivers like Tyler Reddick, Austin Dillon and Truex all wound up shooting themselves in the foot, either on their approach to stops or during the stop itself.
Reddick appeared to suffer the worst of it for much of the afternoon. On lap 83, at the end of stage one, Reddick’s team suffered a jack issue that caused the No. 8 Chevrolet to plummet outside the top 10. After a fourth-place finish in stage one, he found it difficult to maneuver in traffic before a further setback: sliding through his pit stall during a green-flag stop on lap 121.
On the following lap, it was Dillon suffering through a similar jack problem for Richard Childress Racing on pit road, costing the No. 3 Chevrolet valuable track position. At least Dillon was able to fight back over the long term, working his way up into…
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