Pit boxes have come a long way since wagon days (cont'd)

Nelson isn't bitter. As a major player in NASCAR's research and development, he went on to develop a slew of technologies and holds the United States patent as the inventor of the roof flaps.

Moral of the story -- crew chiefs, raised on the high-dollar inventions produced today that resemble mini-suites owe their inventive forefathers a great deal of thanks. Thanks for convenient comforts, less time spent on pit road and even a place for the pretty ladies and suited sponsors to sit and enjoy the show, because it is now thought to be the best seat in the house.

Long-time crew chief Richard "Slugger" Labbe is thankful for the technology because competing crewmembers can no longer sabotage his equipment. Some time before Nelson's final design and after the red Radio Flyers, crew chiefs merely set a couple of nitrogen bottles and an air hose on a jack stand and went to work.

Labbe recalled an incident at O'Reilly Raceway Park in Indianapolis where driver Tommy Ellis got ticked off at his driver Tommy Houston.

"Tommy [Ellis] beat our regulators so we couldn't do pit stops," Labbe laughed. "He beat it with a hammer! If you worked for a good team back then, you had a platform screwed on nitrogen bottle you could stand on. If you had that, no one could beat the regulator up."

Labbe said the "new kids" that go over the wall now don't realize how well they've got it today. "They're spoiled," he said.

The pit box has evolved into a box of technology housing weather forecasting equipment, live timing and scoring and intercom systems enabling the crew chief to communicate covertly with his crew members down below on pit road.

More than that, the crews no longer have to pull their "war wagons" back to the garage after every race.

Since they've grown into these nearly 4,500 pound beasts, they can no longer fit on the team haulers and surpass legal weight limits.

Now, Champion Tire and Wheel is contacted to transport the pit boxes to and from each track.

"That's what amazes me, the size," Labbe said. "And you only use it for about four hours a week and don't see it until Sunday morning. It's a vital part of our team but we entrust it to someone else, we would never think of doing that with our cars. It's crazy to think about."

Crew chief Jimmy Elledge, who has been on both sides of the pit box evolution, said inside the NASCAR garage the mentality remains, "Keep up with the Joneses."

"Every year the pit boxes seem to get bigger and bigger and can hold more and more tools you may never use, but there's a five percent chance that you may use it so you've got to have it," he said.

When he took the job as crew chief at Andy Petree Racing in the late 1990s, Elledge remembered paying $5,000 for a pit box and it was able to fit on the team hauler.

Now at Red Bull Racing, the team custom makes the more than $100,000 crash carts and mini-suites that after each race folds neatly into a compact box to be shipped to the next track.

"With the way things evolve in NASCAR, stuff doesn't get smaller things only get bigger," he said. "But whatever it takes to maximize your time during practice by eliminating trips to the garage can help your performance on Sunday."

So today's pit box is a vital investment that could make or break a team's race on pit road, unlike the "war wagons" and little red Radio Flyers of yesteryear.

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer.