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INDIANAPOLIS – The type of race car doesn’t matter. Juan Pablo Montoya always seems to end up doing well at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway.
Montoya is the first driver to race all three disciplines at Indianapolis – Formula One with McLaren Mercedes, IndyCar with Target Chip Ganassi Racing and now, for the second time, in a stock car with Ganassi.
He won the 2000 Indianapolis 500, raced his last F1 race in Indianapolis and finished second to Tony Stewart in his NASCAR debut here last year.
“It’s always cool,” Montoya said of coming back. “It’s good memories.”
Montoya has more experience around this place than most, but he isn’t sold that his institutional knowledge of the Midwestern landmark track helps.
“I don’t know,” Montoya said. “I like the place. I think I’ve got it figured out but I guess because I got it figured out, it looks pretty simple to me.”
The 32-year-old Colombian qualified 13th at 179.476 mph.
A day after Rusty Wallace said Roger Penske essentially fired Ryan Newman from the No. 12 car after the 2008 season, Penske said Wallace didn’t know what he was talking about.
“I have read Rusty’s comments and it is important for everyone to understand that I did not fire Ryan,” Penske said in a statement. “His contract runs through 2008 and we sat down and agreed that we were not going forward beyond this year.”
Penske’s statement matches what Newman said after he heard about Wallace’s comments Friday – that it was a mutual decision.
On Saturday, after Newman qualified third at the Allstate 400 at the Brickyard for the second consecutive year, he seemed vindicated by Penske’s agreement.
“That’s what I said,” Newman said. “I made some jokes about Rusty and all, but the bottom line is what he said wasn’t true and we’ll go on.”
On Friday, rookie Marcos Ambrose ran two laps in practice and ran into trouble. Having to qualify on time, Ambrose appeared as if he wouldn’t qualify for his team’s first Sprint Cup Series race.
Yet something happened in the 24 hours since practice.
Ambrose qualified in 178.133 mph and will start in the 24th position next to Denny Hamlin on Row 12.
“This is fairly spectacular considering the trouble we had yesterday,” Ambrose said. “We did a whole two laps yesterday and didn’t know what to do with the car. We’re a start-up team, and we made it in today.
“This feels like my first genuine Cup start. I feel like we have climbed Mount Everest after yesterday’s effort. We had less than seven minutes on the race track and here we are, qualified.”
It’d actually be Ambrose’s second Sprint Cup series race – having started seventh and finished 42nd at Infineon.
mrothstein@jg.net
