Though Jimmie will be a nice breath of fresh air, I still would like to see CART/Indy Car add more pit crew and for God's sake, add gantries for the air hoses.. The primitive whipping the air hoses around really is a safety hazard from hell.
Ha, yeah I am with you on the gantries! It's amazing no one (or no thing) has been hit, tangled, etc. Or, they probably have, it just hasn't been disastrous enough to draw notice.
As far as pit crew goes, I think I'd keep it as is. I think having a skeleton pit crew:
1) First and foremost, keeps things safer. Having as few guys on that side of the wall during refuelling seems good to me.
2) It introduces more randomness, I suspect. Sure, the pit stops in F1 are a thing of beauty, but when you watch a cycle of pit stops and they're all 1.9-2.5 seconds...meh, it all kind of washes out. And seeing a 1.9 second pit stop is fun for the first few times but, when the incredible becomes routine, it's still routine. Just my 2 cents. Seems as though in IndyCar, it's way more likely to see an overly long pit stop that really shakes up strategy.
3) I'm assuming smaller crews = smaller expenses. I'm all for whatever keeps costs down in IndyCar. I love that we see what are essentially privateer* teams in IndyCar, I want to keep the racing accessible for those types!
* We don't seem to call them "privateer" in the states but, then again, I don't think I really hear that word, like, ever in the US. If not for racing, if I heard the word "privateer", I think I would picture 16th/17th century swashbucklers! Thank you, Sid Meier's Pirates!