As several has said already; pitstops are an essential part of a race, and a fun/interesting part that is. With pitstop strategies (that can be changed over the course of the race) longer races are very exiting until the last car has crossed the finishline.
Was really taken by surprise here (reading the speculations
). I just assumed it would be in for the 1.0, if that's the version that will be shipped as a finished product. My own personal ego do not need pitstop animations or very complicated feedbacks from the garage crew. Just a plain text-controlled app, that activates once you find your pitzone etc (compare with LFS/STCC etc). Need to be able to control fuel/tyrechoice/wings/damage/susp/...etc.
The pitlane is there, so I guess at some point it will transfer from placeholder to a functioning garage. Even if time is pressing, I would (like Kevin Watts) expect it to be on the top priority list for updates near 1.0. As a matter of fact, without pitstops, AC will (for me) be half as fun as LFS/STCC, but with functioning pitstops it would carry 10x more value/weight as those just mentioned. I will nevertheless, enjoy Kunos masterpiece for whatever it is/becomes. Just my own few comments on this subject.