Jun 15th, 2010 by T.C.
Every track we go to has unique challenges on pit road. At short tracks like Martinsville, the stalls are very small; Phoenix and Darlington have curved pit roads; Kentucky has the world’s thinnest pit wall; and at Watkins Glen we pit backwards. Until only a few short years ago however, nobody had a pit road situation like Infineon Raceway.
Before 2002, Infineon Raceway (then Sears Point Raceway) actually had two pit roads. As it is today, the entrance for the main pit road was entered on driver’s left as they came down the straight before turn 11. This pit road however, only had 34 pit stalls. The remaining drivers who qualified in positions 35-43 had to pit on what was referred to as “Gilligan’s Island.” This smaller pit road was on driver’s right as they exited turn 11.
I found a video on YouTube from the 1998 Savemart 350 at Sears Point that shows a great view of the Island. Scroll ahead to the 6:53 mark, and you will see Robert Pressley make an unscheduled stop for a flat tire. As you can see, on “Gilligan’s Island,” teams had to do pit stops backwards. On top of that, since the stretch was so much shorter, NASCAR would actually hold teams in their stalls for as many as 15 seconds after their stop was completed, before they would allow them to leave. This, in NASCAR’s view, equalized any advantage a team would gain by using the much shorter pit road.
Besides creating unique pit stop situations, the Island offered up other problems. First, being out there meant teams were really on an island. Once the race started, there was no way to get back across the track. This required teams to have any spare pieces in their stalls that they may need in case of a crash or other problem. There would be no running back to the hauler for that spare battery.
Also, if a team did happen to crash out or blow an engine, they had to stay on “Gilligan’s Island” until the race was complete. There would have been no early exit for you start-and-parkers either!
Thankfully, along with many other improvements, the track was reconfigured in 2002 to allow for all 43 cars to have space on pit road. The Island was thus gone forever, and that area inside the hairpin at turn 11 was turned into runoff.
Who’s ready for some road course racing?!
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