Juan Pablo Montoya

Well having had a look to see if he had his own thread i thought that Montoya is long over due one.

Juan Pablo Montoya divided alot of F1 fans opinions of him.

Some thought he was a bit of a dill and others thought he was quite cool.

Myself i thought he was a man with a big ego with bags of talent but never let it out.

Montoya entered F1 in 2001 replacing Jenson Button at BMW Williams and partnered Ralf Schumacher for 4 years before moving to Mclaren in 2005 to join Kimi Raikkonen at the team.

Montoya announced himself to the F1 world with a sensational move on the Legendary Michael Schumacher at turn one in Brazil 2001. But his F1 career didn't get off to the best of starts, he retired from his first two races. However at the Brazilian GP we were about to crown Montoya with his first F1 race win until Jos Verstappen's Arrows took him out of the race whilst in the lead.

Montoya did eventually score his first points in the 5th Round at The Spanish GP finishing a brilliant second behind Michael Schumacher.

2001 was a mixed year for Montoya, he only managed to finish 6 races, claiming 3 Poles and 4 podiums which included his maiden Grand Prix Victory at Monza.

In 2002 Montoya was mainly the best of the rest his Williams team car was never able to match the Dominance of the Ferrari team. He matched them on a few occasions but Ferrari won 15 of the 17 GP's that year. However Montoya did manage to get 7 Pole Positions.

In 2003, this was the year when we saw a very good championship battle between Montoya, Raikkonen and Schumacher. Montoya finished third in the Championship having falling out of the Championship race with one race to go. Montoya did however win the race that most F1 drivers would love to win the 2003 Monaco GP.

In 2004, Williams just lacked the pace of the Ferrari's and Mclaren's. After much promise in the early stages of the season but that promise faded. However at the Last race of the season Montoya won a closely fought battle with Mclaren's Kimi Raikkonen to win the Brazilian GP and sign off his Williams career in style.

In 2005, Montoya moved to Mclaren Mercedes to Partner Kimi Raikkonen. He finished his debut race finishing 6th and scoring his first points at Mclaren. Montoya then had a mysterious shoulder injury caused by coming off a motorbike. However at the time we were all told it was an injury from a game of tennis. Montoya then went on to claim his first victory for Mclaren at the British GP, he profitted from his teammates bad luck. Montoya went on to win 2 more races that year in Italy and Brazil to finish 4th in the championship.

In 2006, Montoya had a decent start to the year in a car that wasn't great at all. Montoya finished a best placed 2nd at the Monaco grand prix. However Montoya's year was about to turn into a nightmare. At the United States Grand Prix he caused a multiple pile-up and took out a number of drivers including his teammate Kimi Raikkonen. After that Montoya was immediately given the sack and was replaced by Pedro De La Rosa for the rest of the season.


Montoya had his good moments but he had many bad and really should have been in F1 longer than he was. But in his short spell in F1 he brought some much needed personality.
 
If he could handle Schumacher how come he never beat him? Even in 03 when he had the best car?
.


He handled him here:D

and if he wasn't playing second fiddle to Kimi why did he play his back-up driver for Kimi's 05 championship challenge?

I cant remember the deatils of 05, I doubt he was playing back up, and if he was then thats why he left, he's not a Barrichello. But mclaren let there drivers race, he left because he was pissed of with the politics.

Good job for you he did actually Racecub or we might very well have had to wait a tad longer for a certain Lewis Hamilton.

Now this is a very good point!! But what they should have done was had Lewis and juan:1st::2nd::cheer:dream team for me:D
 
The car didnt suit.

I understand that different drivers have different reactions to cars and tyres, but to me, to say the 'car didn't suit' is not doing any driver any favour.

A bad workman blames his tools and a potential champion gets to grips with what he is given and makes it work - that's the difference surely!
 
No he was better than Kimi. The car didnt suit. If he'd had the 2007 car things would have been very different

Considering that McLaren had two programme's going for each of their cars and drivers back then as has been reported, then I find it hard to believe the car suited one better than the other when the cars were adjusted to each driver.
 

He handled him here:D



I cant remember the deatils of 05, I doubt he was playing back up, and if he was then thats why he left, he's not a Barrichello. But mclaren let there drivers race, he left because he was pissed of with the politics.



Now this is a very good point!! But what they should have done was had Lewis and juan:1st::2nd::cheer:dream team for me:D

You posting that clip makes me realise you missed the point. Yes that was a brilliant overtake by Montoya but lets look at the result of the Grand Prix - Michael Schumacher 2nd - Juan Pablo Montoya - retired with a blown tyre. Bit of a hollow victory isn't it? Lets look at the championship this year Michael Schumacher 1st with 148 points. Juan Pablo Montoya 5th with 58 points. So that overtake looks like a bit of a hollow victory really doesn't it? So my point about him not handling Schumacher remains - yes in his day he could compete with Schumi but he could never keep it up and Schumacher always won - even in 03 when Montoya had the advantage for most of the season. It cracked Juan Pablo's ego and you can see after 03 he was reckless and by the time we get to 06 lack luster.

As for the Kimi thing - I think you might be a bit blinded by fandom.
 
No he was better than Kimi. The car didnt suit. If he'd had the 2007 car things would have been very different

Despite missing two races, JPM was 8-7 up in the Championship against Kimi after the 2005 San Marino Grand Prix. From that point on, JPM scored 78 points up to him heading off to NASCAR, whereas Kimi scored 144. In addition, Kimi beat JPM in the 2003 Championship despite a clearly inferior McLaren.

Your statement is backed up with so little evidence it is frankly worrying.
 
You posting that clip makes me realise you missed the point. Yes that was a brilliant overtake by Montoya but lets look at the result of the Grand Prix - Michael Schumacher 2nd - Juan Pablo Montoya - retired with a blown tyre. Bit of a hollow victory isn't it? Lets look at the championship this year Michael Schumacher 1st with 148 points. Juan Pablo Montoya 5th with 58 points. So that overtake looks like a bit of a hollow victory really doesn't it? So my point about him not handling Schumacher remains - yes in his day he could compete with Schumi but he could never keep it up and Schumacher always won - even in 03 when Montoya had the advantage for most of the season. It cracked Juan Pablo's ego and you can see after 03 he was reckless and by the time we get to 06 lack luster.

As for the Kimi thing - I think you might be a bit blinded by fandom.

He did lots of overtakes like that one. And he didn t have to ask his team mate to pull over for him like Schumacher, had he done that the results may have been different. Didnt cheat either.
 
Can we try not to make this personal folks - we're all entitled to a different opinions on drivers and tit for tat responses really aren't going to change someone else's point of view.

Cheers

FB
 
Doing lots of overtakes doesn't necessarily lead to good results.

The point Rasp is trying to make (I think) is that while JP had brilliant overtakes he never beat Schumi in the championship. And that's what counts in the end.

edit; oops sorry FB, you posted while I was typing. Feel free to delete if you think it's necessary :)
 
He did lots of overtakes like that one. And he didn t have to ask his team mate to pull over for him like Schumacher, had he done that the results may have been different. Didnt cheat either.

ahhh yes I forgot Schumie won all his titles by cheating and making his team-mate move over. You are clearly right I mean without help from Irvine and Barrichello I doubt Schunacher would have won any titles they were so much quicker than him it was so plain to see.
 
Being great at overtaking is a useful skill to have, but if you find yourself having to pull those sorts of moves off in every race, I think it suggests something is going wrong somewhere else.
 
Please can we not make this personal and sling insults or sarcastic comments at one another - we're all entitled to an opinion. My finger is hovering over the delete key...

FB
 
The site finally gets some credit!

Read the articel. Have to say the way its trying to make Montoya sound like the victim who was driven out of an unappreciative F1 actually makes me think the other way round. "Everyone in the sport had respect for Michael Schumacher but I didn't" he says. Sorry Juan but there is no doubt Schumacher was a supreme driver whatever you thought of him as a person or of his tactics so saying you had no respect for him makes you siund petty and bitter. You're not saying you like him or approve of him, You're saying you have respect for him as a rival. You've never of heard the likes of Prost and Senna say they didn't have respect for each other. Just sort of highlights to me why he was disliked by some and seen as a petulent sulky child. It also glosses over the fact that the reason he became 'fed up' with F1 is that he never got over being beaten for the 2003 title and his form went kerplunk.

Montoya was/is a fantastic driver and was great to watch. Lets not make him a saint though.
 
It is refreshing to hear from a driver's perspective he felt Schumacher had almost every advantage given to him even the stewards appeared to be in his favour.

Montoya was certainly disappointment of the 2000's. He was billed as part of the new generation post Schumacher along with Alonso, Raikkonen and Button. He was exciting at times but also erratic. I admire his ability to overtake which reminded me of Nigel Mansell at his best especially on Schumacher. However his fiery temperament always got the better of him

He lost 2003 championship through being conservative and making amateurish mistakes although the penalty he got in Indy was very dubious

He allowed the politics to drive him into making a rather irrational and ill advised decision to join Mclaren and compromising his own 2004 season. The team were suppose to help him iron out his rough edges but he ended up regressing ...he never got going with his injury missing two races and lacking consistency including a couple of amateurish which even incurred the wrath of Raikkonen and cost the team the constructor's title

. He was driven out of F1 when really he should have stuck out in 2006. I think Red Bull were the only team interested in him which meant being paired with his nemesis DC which would have been interesting as apparently DC attempted to veto him as a teammate.

Whilst he made Schumacher his main enemy, he did not approach it in the right way to beat him. Look at both Alonso and Raikkonen both wanted to ensure they were able to do it on the track and outracing him


I wonder if Hamilton had been in his position would the outcome be different? I would think so
 
Saw something that could be potentially interesting from wtf1 i saw on my twitter feed earlier that Juan Pablo Montoya is rumoured to have his eye racing at le mans in 2016 as he wants to join Graham Hill as only people to have completed Triple Crown of Motorsport Monaco GP Indy 500 Le Mans. That if it pulled off would be fantastic & I think if he got an audi or porsche seat he would have a very good chance because he is great driver where ever he's been indycar nascar champ car f1

Montoya Up For Racing At Le Mans To Complete Motorsport Triple Crown

The Monaco Grand Prix, the Indy 500 and the Le Mans 24 Hours are arguably the three greatest motorsport races in the world but only one man has ever won all three of them, Graham Hill. Unofficially named the ‘Triple Crown of Motorsport’ it’s a record that could stand forever but now Juan Pablo Montoya has announced his intentions to give it a go. Montoya is the only active racing driver to hold two legs of the Triple Crown having won the Monaco Grand Prix in 2003 and the Indy 500 twice

.Montoya revealed at the FIA Sport Conference in Mexico. “At some point do I want to try and win the 24 Hours? Yes,”

To add fuel to the fire, boss of the World Endurance Championship, Gerard Neveu has already announced his interest in seeing Montoya at Le Mans. “A champion like Juan Pablo is always welcome to on the grid,” said Neveu. “His achievements and his character are fantastic and I am sure that, if he wants, he can find a seat in an LMP1 car, to fight for the victory. We would really like to have a champion like him.”
 
Jacques Villeneurve has had a few goes at this and not pulled it off. I'd like to see Montoya have a go at it but I'm not sure which team he'd pair up with.
 
Well, he's a Chevrolet driver at the moment, but there are historic links between Penske and Porsche, and arguably GM and Porsche aren't competing in the same marketplace, save for perhaps the Corvette.

More importantly, would he be any good? In his F1 days he had a few off weekends, and these days you can't afford an 'off' stint at Le Mans if you want to win. Mentioning no former F1 driver names.
 
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