Montoya committed to helping get Ganassi Racing on track

By Lee Montgomery - Associate Editor

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Doug Pensinger
Getty Images for NASCAR

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INDIANAPOLIS – Juan Pablo Montoya said he is committed to Chip Ganassi Racing and believes the team will turn its fortunes around soon.

Montoya is mired in 20th in the Sprint Cup standings, more than 1,000 points behind leader Kyle Busch. In his second full year in NASCAR, Montoya has only one top-10 finish in 2008.

The former Formula One driver said he will be back with Ganassi next season and laughed when he said he has a “few” more years on his contract with CGR.

“I’ll tell you the truth: If I wanted to leave and I would go ... , Chip probably would let me go,” Montoya said as Sprint Cup teams prepared for Sunday’s Allstate 400 at Indianapolis Motor Speedway. “That’s the kind of relationship I have with Chip. But as long as he’s committed to this, I’m committed to this.”

Montoya said the team “freakin’ better” turn its performance around.

“There’s two ways to look at it: We either change it around or he’s going to be looking to close the team and I’ll be looking to drive somewhere else,” Montoya said. “This is a business. As long as you don’t get performance, you’re not going to get anything else.”

Montoya joined Ganassi two years ago after winning seven times in Formula One. Montoya won at Infineon Raceway last year, but the No. 42 team seems to have digressed this year.

Part of the problem, Montoya said, was the unsponsored No. 40 Dodge that was recently shut down.

“The focus of the team was making sure the 40 car made the race every week,” Montoya said. “That was the main goal of the company, is making sure that car could get back in the top 35. A lot of money that was for development was put in there to run the car because the car wasn’t fully funded.

“It was hard. I think the company now understands what needs to be done a little bit more. I think we will get better.”

Montoya returns to Indy after finishing second to Tony Stewart last year. He didn’t sound optimistic about a repeat performance in the new model car.

“If we can run anywhere close to the pace we had last year, I’ll be very happy,” Montoya said. “Do I want to win the race? Yeah. Who doesn’t? … It’s a very special race track. But being realistic, our main goal is get ourselves better. The whole Ganassi organization is in a little bit of a hole, and we know that.

“But we’re starting to understand what we need to do and where we need to go as an organization to make ourselves better. I think we will.”