No looking back
Juan Pablo Montoya sat quietly in the shade of an umbrella in his team’s hospitality area at the Canadian Grand Prix, enjoying the buzz of activity around him.
“I love Formula One,” he said, smiling. “It hasn’t gone perfectly for me, but I enjoy the people, and the racing is great.”
Four years into his F1 career, the 28-year-old Colombian – a former CART champion (now Champ Car) and Indy 500 winner – is still trying to make his mark in the world of Grand Prix racing.
Since moving in 2001 from the CART series in America to Frank Williams’ team, Montoya has shown only flashes of the brilliance he displayed on this side of the pond. He’s won only three times in 58 F1 starts and placed third in the points in each of the last two years.
Heading into today’s U.S. Grand Prix at Indianapolis, he was sixth in the points standings.
Though Montoya is still driving for Williams, he has signed with Team McLaren for 2005. Dissatisfaction with the Williams cars and some friction within the team, particularly with some engineers, caused him to look elsewhere.
“He has great potential and we are truly sorry to lose him, but that’s his life,” Williams said. “Maybe he’ll come back one day.”
In the first eight races this year, Montoya managed only two podium finishes – second in Malaysia and third in San Marino. In Canada, he had a solid fifth-place showing but saw his efforts go for naught when the FIA disqualified four cars, including his and teammate Ralf Schumacher’s, for using illegal front brake ducts.
It was just another in a series of frustrating races for Montoya.
Meanwhile, Ferrari’s Michael Schumacher has been overpowering, winning seven times already this season, including in Canada.
Montoya, hoping by this time to be battling the six-time F1 champion at the front of the pack on a regular basis, wants more than he is getting from Williams.
“Formula One is so dependent on how quick the car is,” Montoya said. “In Champ Car, when I was there, 80 percent of the people had the same chassis and a third of the grid had the same engine and the team could work on the car to make it better. You could improve a lot by putting a mega-lap in. Here, if the car is not quick enough, it’s not quick enough.”
He cited as an example the case of Canadian driver Jacques Villeneuve, another former CART champion and Indy winner who moved to F1, won the 1997 championship and then went into a prolonged slump that eventually cost him his ride with British American Racing.
“The car wasn’t quick enough and what? Everybody forgot about him,” Montoya said. “Formula One is a tough business, whether you like it or not.”
In a bit of irony, Villeneuve, currently without a ride, could be a candidate to replace Montoya.
Montoya says his lame-duck season status with Williams has not been a problem for him or the team.
“I think I’m driving good,” he said. “Frank thinks I’m driving good. Anything else, I don’t care.”
Williams, who spotted Montoya in Formula 3000 and recommended him to Chip Ganassi’s CART team in 1999, is confident he is still getting an honest effort from the driver.
“There’s been no evidence to date, and I doubt that there will be the rest of the season, that he’s not giving us anything but his best,” Williams said. “He is just hyper, hyper competitive.
“When Juan is in the car, he’s doing what he was born to do.”
Montoya insists he isn’t concerned that McLaren’s Kimi Raikkonen, last year’s series runner-up, and longtime star David Coulthard are having an even worse season than he is. Those two have not had a podium finish and the team has had a series of engine failures.
“They can keep blowing (up), I don’t care,” Montoya said, shrugging. “I’ll be more interested in the last two races than now because this is not the car I will be racing next year. I’m concerned about getting a good car when I start driving for them and seeing what I can help on and how I can improve the car.
“I’m not going to cheer for them,” he added. “I’m still a Williams driver and I want to beat them. I want to beat everybody.”