Montoya's optimism does not include Indy repeat

Juan Montoya is back on familiar turf this weekend, but he doesn't necessarily like his chances of winning the Allstate 400 at the Brickyard that will be run at Indianapolis Motor Speedway.

In fact, in a very candid interview with media Friday at the facility, Montoya admitted that he would be surprised to be able to duplicate last year's effort -- when he qualified second and finished second during his rookie season driving the No. 42 Dodge for Chip Ganassi Racing with Felix Sabates.

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It's this simple: there are two ways to look at it -- we either change it around or he's going to be looking to close it and I'll be looking to drive somewhere else, because this is a business.
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JUAN MONTOYA"If we can run anywhere close to the pace we ran last year, I would be happy," Montoya said. "Do I want to win the race? Of course. Who doesn't? Ask any driver here if he wants to win the race and he would say yes. It's a very special place.

"But I think being realistic, our main goal right now is just to get ourselves better. The whole Ganassi organization right now is in a little bit of a hole, and we know that. But I think we're starting to understand what we need to do and where we need to go to make ourselves better, and I think we will."

Pressed further on if he can duplicate last year's performance, which marked his best effort on an oval, Montoya admitted it will be extremely difficult. He said that is especially so because this is the first time NASCAR's new car will be run at the Indy track, and the new car that is being used full time in the Sprint Cup Series this season has given Montoya and his Ganassi teammates loads of trouble.

"It's very hard to say you can, because the cars are different. You look at the mile-and-halves last year and we always had a really good car. If we nailed the setup, we had [potentially] a top-five car every week. It was easy," Montoya said.

"But this year, on the big tracks, we struggle. If you look at the bigger picture, there's nothing to say we're going to go out here and win."

Montoya spent much of last Thursday in Ganassi's Indianapolis-based IndyCar shop, talking about what needs to be done to change that. Ganassi and Montoya shared great success on the open-wheel side before joining forces in NASCAR, with Montoya capturing the 1999 CART championship and the 2000 Indianapolis 500 in rides provided by Ganassi.

They have been unable to reclaim that glory in the Sprint Cup Series. When Montoya won last year at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma, Calif., it was the first Cup victory for Ganassi's operation since 2002.