Harvick, Montoya in shoving match at the Glen
WATKINS GLEN, N.Y. - Juan Pablo Montoya has done his share of beating and banging on the track during his rookie year in Nextel Cup racing, but on Sunday, he got his first taste of physical confrontation - NASCAR style.
Montoya was running sixth, trailing Kevin Harvick in fifth, on a restart on Lap 73 of Sunday's Centurion Boats at The Glen, but neither Montoya nor Harvick made it through the first corner. Montoya went low into the turn to close the door on Martin Truex Jr., but Truex tapped the bumper of Montoya's No. 42 Dodge and spun him.
Montoya's car slid sideways into Harvick's No. 29 Chevrolet, taking out both cars. Trying to find a hole in the melee, Jeff Burton was unable to avoid Montoya and caught a piece of the wreck.
Harvick and Montoya quickly climbed from their cars and engaged in a shoving match before NASCAR officials stepped between them.
"I just got run over," Harvick said. "I guess the No. 1 [of Truex] ran over the 42. It's one of those things where our Shell-Pennzoil Chevrolet was really good there at the end, and it just felt like we'd saved our car enough to have a chance to win there, and it all goes up in smoke, because some people get impatient.
"But I just hate it. I'm frustrated with the No. 42. It just seems like he runs over somebody every week."
Asked what he and Montoya were saying to each other, Harvick replied, "I was talking about kicking his ass, because that's how I felt about it."
Montoya, on the other hand, felt he was blameless in the incident.
"Our restarts were always slow," Montoya said. "I went to the inside to defend the No. 1 car, and he spun me from behind. When he spun me, I got backward into the 29. [Harvick] got out of the car, came out disrespectful, saying all kinds of things, grabbed me - and I don't appreciate that.
"I'll say 'I'm sorry,' when it's my fault, but when it's not my fault, I don't want him to come over and push me like that. I have a little respect for the guy - well, I used to have a little respect for the guy - because he helped me a lot to start with. I tried to tell him this."
The real innocent victim, however, was Burton, who couldn't avoid the wreck in front of him.
"The No. 42 [of Montoya] was trying to block the No. 1 [of Truex], and the No. 1 got into the back of the No. 42, and it all went downhill from there," Burton said. "I thought we were clear, but the No. 42 didn't hold the brake. He let his foot off the brake and let it roll back across the track, and I had nowhere to go."
Stevie Reeves, Jimmie Johnson's spotter, had his own perspective as he watched from the top of the main grandstand.
"I went to the No. 42 spotter and handed him a pack of Big Red [Montoya's sponsor] and told him, 'I don't feel like eatin' that no more,'" Reeves radioed to his driver after the smoke cleared.
