Jared Turner: Juan Pablo Montoya quietly making presence known in Chase
Earnhardt Ganassi Racing's Juan Pablo Montoya is making a run at the 2009 NASCAR Sprint Cup championship.
// Jim Fluharty, NASCAR Scene
COMMENTARY
It’s incredible to think just how much the odds were stacked against Juan Pablo Montoya even making NASCAR’s 2009 Chase For The Sprint Cup.
Yet here we are, four races into the season’s championship-determining segment, and Montoya is not only part of the Chase, but he has finished no worse than fourth in the opening quartet of Chase events.
And thanks to his surprisingly rock-solid start to NASCAR’s 10-race playoff, he’s third in the standings and only 58 points out of the lead.
Whoever said NASCAR was no longer a sport for underdogs?
The two guys directly ahead of Montoya in points and the two directly behind him (no one else really still has a shot at this title) are the direct antithesis to Montoya on so many levels.
While Jimmie Johnson, Mark Martin, Tony Stewart and Jeff Gordon have nine championships among them, Montoya had never even been in championship contention before this season.
While the other top-five points contenders have combined for 15 wins in 2009 alone, Montoya has one win in 103 starts. The Bogota, Colombia, native’s lone triumph came at Infineon Raceway in his rookie year of 2007.
Johnson, Martin and Gordon compete for NASCAR’s premier powerhouse organization in Hendrick Motorsports; Stewart competes for the quickly rising and, yes, Hendrick-affiliated, Stewart-Haas Racing establishment. Montoya, meanwhile, is with an Earnhardt Ganassi Racing outfit that few observers believed could hang with NASCAR’s elite, at least initially, when it formed from the offseason merger of two struggling entities - Chip Ganassi Racing and Dale Earnhardt Inc.
Like Stewart, Montoya raced professionally in the open-wheel ranks before trying his hand at NASCAR. But unlike Stewart, who spent his first 10 Cup seasons with Joe Gibbs Racing, Montoya wasn’t paired with a top-10 team from day one.
And in all reality, he still isn’t. The two-car Earnhardt Ganassi fleet is still light years behind the Hendricks and Roush Fenway Racings and Joe Gibbs Racings of the world in terms of technology, resources and personnel.
Montoya has had to scratch and claw and fight for everything he’s accomplished in NASCAR’s top series – all while continuing to adjust to a new style of racing and a completely different genre of cars.
Montoya’s success has been illuminated by the relative struggles of his former open-wheel counterparts such as Dario Franchitti, Max Papis and Sam Hornish Jr. who either tried NASCAR and quickly moved on (Franchitti), or continue to struggle to find their way in the nation’s top stock-car division (Papis and Hornish).
Montoya, while probably not the most gregarious guy in the Cup garage, has the attitude and fire in his belly to attract hordes of fans – especially among the Hispanic population that NASCAR desperately covets.
Remember that little shoving match he had with Kevin Harvick at Watkins Glen in 2007?
Remember Montoya “swearing on his wife and children” that he wasn’t going too fast on pit road earlier this season at Indianapolis where a speeding penalty erased an almost sure victory?
Remember how just last weekend Montoya very calmly yet assertively responded to a reporter who confronted the driver about allegedly being unwilling to do a one-on-one interview?
Montoya is aggressive, talented and even a little brash – the perfect combination for a guy still trying to make a name for himself at NASCAR’s highest level.
When you really stop and think about it, there’s little not to love about Montoya.
The 34-year-old certainly hasn’t taken the traditional path to NASCAR stardom. Nor has it come overnight or without a fair amount of growing pains along the way.
Of the top five drivers in the standings, only Martin – long considered NASCAR’s best driver to never win a championship – is in the same league with Montoya as far as sentimental favorites are concerned.
And even with Martin’s history of falling just short in championship battles, it’s hard to feel too sorry for a guy who has five wins on the year and is hooked up with an organization that is the word “dynasty” epitomized.
Montoya, with the deck stacked against him, has come out of nowhere to be a major player in this championship race.
Looking for an underdog to hang your hat on as the Chase winds down?
Look no further than Juan Pablo Montoya.
