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BY DAVID POOLE
McClatchy Newspapers
There are plenty of reasons for
Juan Pablo Montoya to be optimistic
about Sunday’s Aaron’s
499 at Talladega Superspeedway.
The former open-wheel racing
star is still looking for his first
Sprint Cup victory on an oval, and his
performance last year at this 2.66-mile
track suggests this could be an opportunity.
Montoya finished second to Kyle
Busch in April and then was leading
when he got caught up in a wreck on
Lap 173 in October. Those races came
in a Dodge, and this year he’s in a No.
42 Chevrolet powered by the same
engines that nearly carried rookie
Regan Smith to the victory in last fall’s
AMP Energy 500.
“Talladega has been a great race
track for me,” Montoya said.
“Everything is in place to run strong.”
What has Montoya more excited,
however, is that he believes those same
things are in place for him to run
strong just about everywhere else, too.
“If you look at the future,” Montoya
said, “we’re looking really good.”
Montoya said he has had “five bad
races” this season, including last
week’s 24th-place finish at Phoenix
that stemmed from a late-race penalty
for speeding on pit road.
“We had a good car, an easy top-10
car,” Montoya said. “I just went a little
too fast in the pits. Just my fault.”
The encouraging thing about the
Phoenix race was that Martin Truex Jr.,
Montoya’s teammate at Earnhardt
Ganassi Racing, finished seventh. In
that race Montoya and Truex both
drove the same style of chassis after the
merger between their respective operations
this offseason.
“I think Phoenix was the first step
toward getting everybody on the same
page,” Montoya said. “It really helped.
… It’s exciting.”
Despite the challenges of marrying
two teams that last year drove for different
manufacturers, and despite three finishes of 24th or
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COURTESY OF NASCAR
Driver Juan Pablo Montoya and the No. 42 team are 15th in the Sprint Cup points standings withtwo top-10 finishes this season.
worse in the season’s
first eight races, Montoya is still
only 36 points outside the top 12 in the
Sprint Cup standings. He believes race
wins and the kind of consistency it will
take to battle for a Chase spot are both
within his team’s reach.
“Before we either waited for a
restrictor-plate race or maybe a mileand-
a-half (to believe) we were going
to run really well,” Montoya said. “The
way we’re running, I think it can come
anywhere. I think our pace is good
enough to start winning anywhere.
“We’re on the right path. We’re very
close. … We’re working hard to make
sure the car to beat is going to be us,
not anybody else.”
But last fall’s experience at
Talladega reminded Montoya that
Talladega can be a place where trouble
finds you.
“Talladega is so much out of your
hands,” he said. “It’s hard to say, yes,
this is where we’re going to go and
win. You can hope it’s going to happen.
Look at last year; we were leading. The
outside lane went past us on the backstretch
and they wrecked and took us
out. If you survive the wreck you might
have a chance. But you have to survive
the wreck first.”
For that reason, Montoya said he’d
rather be leading than anywhere else as
Sunday’s race goes into its final stages.
“If there’s a wreck you have the win
in your pocket,” he said. “Worst-case
scenario you’re going to finish second
or third. … If you’re third or fourth,
you can be involved in the wreck.”
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For the rest of the top-40
rankings, go online and
visit www.thatsracin.com
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