Harvick gets past Montoya to win Toyota Owners 400
Juan Pablo Montoya has won races all over the world, but he hasn't won an oval track race since leaving Formula One for NASCAR in the fall of 2006.
On Saturday night, Montoya was three laps from winning the Toyota Owners 400 at Richmond International Raceway when Brian Vickers crashed to bring out the yellow flag.
Montoya had a five-car length lead over Kevin Harvick at the time.
Surprisingly, Montoya, Harvick and Kurt Busch, who was running third, all decided to pit for new tires.
The decision proved to be a winning one for Harvick. But for Montoya, it was another bitter pill to swallow as he ended up fourth after leading 67 laps.
Montoya had no problems with the decision to pit - in fact, he called it "a no brainer to stop for tires. He felt his downfall on the green-white-checkered flag finish was "I had to start on the outside" as he was sixth at the time.
"We made the right call," continued Montoya. " What hurt us is we restarted on the outside, and when you restart on the outside and people (in front of him) had got really bad tires, everything just backs up. When you are on the inside (like Harvick), you can jump to the inside of those guys.
"After that, I was just trying to get the best finish I could. It has been a rough year for us so far. We've had nothing but bad luck before tonight.
"We had a great car. Same as last week, we had a great car. The pit crew redeemed themselves tonight (after several miscues a week ago). They did a great job all day, no mistakes. This is what we needed."
When asked what he thought when the yellow came out, Montoya paused before saying," well, you know. Nothing I can say (for public consumption). It was still a good night for us. We needed a run like this. We" ll get one (an oval track win). "
Both of his Cup victories have come on a road course.
