Juan Montoya, currently the world's most versatile driver

  • Thread starter Thread starter Earth
  • 21 comments
  • 1,688 views
Earth

Earth

Messages
8,059
Messages
GTP_Royalton
It's difficult if not impossible to tell who the world's best race car driver is, but for me personally drivers who could drive anything fast were always a step ahead of others.

Some say if you are on top of Formula 1, the world's most prestigous racing series then you are the best because you are driving the fastest cars in the world against the top road-racing drivers in the world.

But what about the World Rally Championship? Driving a car as fast as possible on dirt, mud, snow and ice combined with a narrow road has to be as challenging as anything

Or how about stock car racing, heavy, low technology cars that can behave so badly that trying to drive them through the wide sweeping turns of Michigan International Speedway at 170mph can be frightening even to the best

But what if there was a driver who had success at almost every top form of motorsport in the world?

There is a driver, Juan Pablo Montoya

Juan Montoya made his name in CART, winning poles, races and the championship

He then won the Indy 500 in his first and only try

He then went to Formula 1 and won poles and a race in first season, driving for what was then F1's 3rd best team

He went on to win 7 Formula 1 races and was at times declared the heir to Michael Schumacher's ride with Ferrari

But late in his F1 career Montoya became increasingly fusterated with the lack of performance in his car and life in Formula 1

He missed America and grew tired of what he called the bull**** of F1

His aggressive driving style did not fit the extremely delicate, aero dependant cars of F1.

After crashing or spinning out most of the time in 2006 Montoya decided it was time for a change.

Back to Champcar in the states?

No, Juan wanted to go to NASCAR, America's top racing series.

This shocked alot of people, but Juan is a racer. A true racer. The definition of a racer. Determined with a strong will to win. Who wants to pass, and not be passed. He wants to win every race, not just 'bring home a top 10'.

But why exactly did he choose NASCAR?

"NASCAR may not have the most sophisticated cars, but the racing is the best."
- Juan Montoya

That's why he chose NASCAR

His move back to the US also made way for him to try and win in a 3rd major race series, Grand Am.

Juan Montoya won the biggest Indy Car race, the Indy 500, in his first try.

He also won the biggest Grand Am race, the 24 Hours of Daytona in his first try.

Juan Montoya has won the most prestigious event in 3 major racing series:

Indy Cars - Indy 500
Daytona Prototypes - Daytona 24 hours
Formula 1 - Monaco Grand Prix

NASCAR - Dayonta 500 not yet but maybe next year ;)

Recently Juan Montoya won in NASCAR's top division Nextel Cup making him one of the few drivers who have won in F1, NASCAR, Champ Car and Sports Cars.

So I can say without any doubt Juan Pablo Montoya is the most versatile driver in the world.

Jack of all trades but a master of none? I don't think so. He could have done better later in his career in F1 if he molded his driving style to fit what is Formula 1, which means no passing. But that's not him. He dominated champ car and I'm sure he could win more in Indy car or Sports Cars.

His performance on ovals in NASCAR has been great in my opinion considering his background. Sure, he only has 2 top 10s and a dozen finishes 20th or further back but he is doing much better then most openwheel guys who try NASCAR (see Paul Tracy, Chirstian Fittipaldi, Robby Gordon, A.J. Allmendinger the list goes on)

In time I see his oval racing skills improving. I see him making the Chase for the cup next year after he gets seat time at all the oval tracks in a cup car.

But his performance in NASCAR right now on ovals is good considering where he came from

So I give you Juan Pablo Montoya the most versatile driver in the world. Does that equate to the best driver in the world? I would say yes, but other drivers haven't or don't want (see arrogant Michael Schumacher who is too good to drive anything below godly F1) the chance to race other cars so it's impossible to tell
 
Well before the 2005 racing season began, Tony Stewart was in a league of his own.

He had already earned a NASCAR Cup Series championship trophy in 2002, which sat alongside his 1997 IRL IndyCar Series trophy, which was next to a pedestal featuring his four United States Auto Club (USAC) championship rings. He was the first and only driver to have won championships in stock cars, Indy cars and open-wheel Midget, Sprint and Silver Crown cars.

Ever the overachiever, Stewart added to his trophy collection by securing the 2005 NASCAR NEXTEL Cup Series championship, and in doing so, joined an elite group of 14 drivers who have scored multiple Cup Series titles.

"Being in a group of only 14 guys that have won multiple championships means more than just winning the championship by itself," said Stewart, who joins Jeff Gordon as the only active drivers to have more than one championship. "To be in a group where there's only 14 of us in the past 50 years or so that have won more than once is a huge, huge honor."

I think that Tony has him beat.
 
Good points

How long is it before Tony wins the Daytona 24 hours with the Suntrust team?

Shouldn't be long

As for F1, I don't think he can fit into those little things anymore lol
 
Clark achieved 33 pole positions and won 25 races from his 72 Grands Prix starts in championship races. He is remembered for his ability to drive and win in all types of cars and series, including a Lotus-Cortina, with which he won the 1964 British Touring Car Championship, IndyCar, NASCAR, driving a Ford Galaxie for the Holman Moody team, Rallying, where he took part in the 1966 RAC Rally of Great Britain in a Lotus Cortina, and nearly won the event before crashing, and sports cars. He competed in the Le Mans 24 Hour race in 1959, 1960 and 1961, finishing second in class in 1959 driving a Lotus Elite, and finishing third overall in 1960, driving an Aston Martin DBR1.
Click to expand...

Moss, who raced from 1948 to 1962, won 194 of the 497 races he entered, including 16 Formula One Grands Prix. He once told an interviewer that he had participated in 525 races overall, as many as 62 in a single year, in 84 different cars. Like many drivers of the era, he competed in several formulae - sometimes at the same time.
Click to expand...

He has competed and won in many different types of auto racing, including stock cars, midget cars, sprint cars, IndyCars, drag racing cars, sports cars, and single-seater Formula One cars. During his career, Andretti won four IndyCar titles, the 1978 Formula One World Championship, and IROC VI (the 1978 - 1979 IROC). To date, he remains the only driver ever to win the Indianapolis 500 (1969), NASCAR's Daytona 500 (1967), and the Formula One World Championship, and, along with Juan Pablo Montoya, the only driver to have won a race in the NASCAR Cup series, Formula 1, and a Indianapolis 500. No American has won a Formula One race since Andretti at the 1978 Dutch Grand Prix.[1] Andretti had 109 career wins on major circuits.[2]
Click to expand...

Compared to those above, JPM has done nothing.
 
I changed the title of the thread because of your post

A.J. Foyt, Mario Andretti Jim Clark and others are great drivers who've won almost everything but I was talking about today's most versital driver, sorry should have made that clearer
 
And the last time he won a championship was?



1999 cart
1998 FIA

So he really must be good Hun
6 years since he won a championship, just because he's won a race in Nextel I wouldn't put him on such a high podium. The way he's driving trying to boot others out of the way just wait a few more races and you'll see that other drivers are going to boot him into a wall.
 
Oooowwwww someone's a F1 hater :lol:

Some say if you are on top of Formula 1, the world's most prestigous racing series then you are the best because you are driving the fastest cars in the world against the top road-racing drivers in the world.

But what about the World Rally Championship? Driving a car as fast as possible on dirt, mud, snow and ice combined with a narrow road has to be as challenging as anything
Click to expand...
He then went to Formula 1 and won poles and a race in first season, driving for what was then F1's 3rd best team
Click to expand...
At the time I think it's fair to argue they weren't.
Jack of all trades but a master of none? I don't think so. He could have done better later in his career in F1 if he molded his driving style to fit what is Formula 1, which means no passing.
Click to expand...
(see arrogant Michael Schumacher who is too good to drive anything below godly F1)
Click to expand...
:lol:
 
I've always been a fan of JPM.
But don't forget J. Villeneuve I think he has accomplished just about everything JPM ever did and he was once F1 champion (although I don't think he ever won in Monaco) and was running reasonably well in this years Lemans until the car retired very late in the race.
 
Actually I’d say, for sure, Sebastian Loeb is currently the most versatile racing driver.
 
Originally Posted by GTA_Phreak
I've always been a fan of JPM.
But don't forget J. Villeneuve I think he has accomplished just about everything JPM ever did and he was once F1 champion (although I don't think he ever won in Monaco) and was running reasonably well in this years Lemans until the car retired very late in the race.
Click to expand...
Originally Posted by
Actually I’d say, for sure, Sebastian Loeb is currently the most versatile racing driver.
Click to expand...

Both of you are right,they are currently the most versatile driver in the world (imo) J.V. did a whole lot more than JPM did in his entire life! He could do many things other than racing too!(do a search on him at wikipedia.Too bad he's arrogant and is a sore loser :lol: ) So does Loeb.Not only the master of WRC (much like Schumi was in F1) he could do well in other motor sports as well.

Originally Posted by Earth
Jack of all trades but a master of none? I don't think so. He could have done better later in his career in F1 if he molded his driving style to fit what is Formula 1, which means no passing.
Click to expand...

Actually he is.What does JPM do that many others have done (some even did more than JPM could ever done)Sure,he could win all the the most prestigious event in 3 major racing series but does he win all the cmapionship? No! (however J.V. could back it up.Winning the Indy 500 and F1 championship and was even close to winning the Le Mans)
 
Valentino Rossi? Not quite yet, but he's getting there. MotoGP, Rallying & F1 testing.
 
If by most versatile driver you mean an expert at punting people off track, than yeah I guess Montoya wins hands down...
 
The world's most versatile driver is Sebastien Loeb, not Juan-Pablo Montoya.

That being said, back in his early F1 days, it looked like Montoya was the heir to Senna. He used to get pole position quite a few times and was very agressive and not afraid to pull moves. But from 2004 on, things didn't go so well anymore.

Congrats to his NASCAR win.
 
I think it's very difficult to judge versatility in drivers these days. Drivers on the single seater ladder will probably never even think of driving in any other form of racing - they all aim for F1 (or IRL/CART in the US). Does this mean that they wouldn't or couldn't excel at Touring Cars or Sports Cars? No.

You only have to look into the background of most of the drivers who are 'gods' in their particular area of motorsport (i'm talking circuit racing here) and you'll find drivers who could'nt get as far as F1. If current F1 drivers were to diversify, i'm sure you'd find them at the top of their game no matter what form of racing they went into.
 
Whilst Loeb is undoubtedly a phenomenon, he simply doesn't have the "out of area" pedigree of others. I don't see how you can count him.

Earth
(see arrogant Michael Schumacher who is too good to drive anything below godly F1)
Click to expand...
That's a fairly oafish remark

I think that Sebastien Bourdais is a handy pedaller in whatever he drives, but he lacks success out of area, and whilst he was impressive in F1 testing and at Le Mans, there is as yet no win to his name.

Valentino Rossi makes a very strong case for himself, but the fact is that he was well over a second off the pace in pretty well all of his F1 tests with Ferrari. But he has done far better than expected in rallying at the highest level, so you can give him good marks.

Colin McRae has transferred his undisciplined style to other forms of motorsport, acquitting himself extraordinarily well in a Jordan F1 test, then doing similarly so in both Le Mans and the Lisbon-Dakar race.

But in terms of multidisciplinary success, and also of shortest time to winning in a new formula, for a currently competitive driver, I think that Juan Pablo Montoya is hard to argue against. He also had a very strong run in dirt-track midgets recently, let's not forget.
 
A name that just came to my mind is Ryan Briscoe. He hasn’t got too many wins to his name, but he’s done just about everything in road racing (I can’t remember the last time he’s done an entire season of something) and tends to set a pretty reasonable pace right from the outset.
 
Stéphane Sarrazin? F1 racer, rally driver and Le Mans racer, all within the past 8 years or so. Never did overly well though - DNF in his only F1 start, best result of 4th in a WRC Subaru, but is doing better in sportscars with a pole and 2nd place finish at Le Mans the other week.
 

Latest Posts

Back