In the NASCAR O’Reilly Auto Parts Series, the accidents typically happen on the racetrack.
Not on Saturday, though, in the Nu Way 225 at World Wide Technology Raceway (WWT Raceway), where one of the circuit’s narrowest pit roads got completely logjammed during a routine caution flag pit stop after the race’s first stage.
With the back half of the field unable to advance past the wreckage (as well as Corey Day, who finished second in Stage 1 and was pitted in the first pit stall), NASCAR was forced to throw a red flag.
The incident itself began inside the top-10 when William Sawalich slowed dramatically to pull into his pit stall, but behind, the field stacked up. Jeremy Clements got into the back of Anthony Alfredo, who got into the back of Nick Sanchez, who was then pushed into Rajah Caruth, who was spun horizontally across the pit lane.
Behind that, there was simply no hope for a lot of drivers coming into the pits behind. Harrison Burton, Dean Thompson, Brandon Jones, and several others sustained a decent amount of damage in the wreck, as well – Burton and Sanchez were forced to retire from the event with substantial damage.
Not involved in the stack-up but involved in the incident was Brent Crews.
Crews sustained a bit of damage to the right rear of the No. 19 YoungLife Toyota GR Supra, when Sanchez’s No. 87 hurdled into the stationary Joe Gibbs Racing machine, while the crew was performing the pit stop. One crew member was struck by the car, and the tire in his hand was launched down pit road, but several had narrow misses, in a situation that could have been much worse.
Joe Gibbs Racing says all No. 19 pit crew members involved in the incident on pit road are unharmed.
While only two drivers were taken out of the race because of this incident, several, with damage, that have been impacted greatly by this stack-up on pit road, with damage to their vehicles.
