Montoya: Räikkönen has promise in NASCAR

Juan Pablo Montoya thought former Formula 1 teammate Kimi Raikkonen did a good job in his NASCAR debut, and expects to see him in a Sprint Cup Series race this season.

But if Raikkonen is serious about NASCAR, Montoya said the former world champion will have to move to the United States and race as often as possible.

"If you are going to do it, you've got to do it properly," Montoya said Saturday at Charlotte Motor Speedway. "It will bite you if you don't do it properly."

Raikkonen made his NASCAR debut in Friday night's Trucks Series race, finishing 15th driving for Kyle Busch Motorsports. The Finn has not officially announced his next race, but Busch admitted after the race there's a car ready for Raikkonen to use in next week's Nationwide Series event at Charlotte.

Busch insisted KBM does not own the car, and it's believed Raikkonen will be officially entered by Nemco Motorsports, the team owned by Joe Nemechek.

Montoya believes Raikkonen will quickly make the move through Nationwide and into the elite Sprint Cup Series to see if he likes driving stock cars. Montoya, a Colombian who lives full-time in Miami, is in his fifth season driving for Chip Ganassi. He's won two Sprint Cup race, both on road courses, and qualified once for the Chase for the Sprint Cup championship.

"He's got to get to Cup," said Montoya, who added he thinks Raikkonen can make the transition. "He needs experience. He's been around, he's done Formula 1, he's done it all. So for him, he's got to understand the ovals and he's got to get a Cup ride.

"But I think if he had a decent car, he'd be fine."

Raikkonen spent nine years in F1, driving for Sauber, McLaren and Ferrari. He totaled 18 wins, 62 podium finishes and won the 2007 championship.

He's currently racing for the World Rally Car Championship with his own team, ICE 1 Racing, and is ranked eighth in the overall standings. He's not scheduled to compete again in that series until next month in Greece.

Raikkonen said after the race it went better than he expected after struggling through two practice sessions earlier in the day, but he wished he'd finished higher and thought the 10 cautions slowed his rhythm.

"The racing was fun," Raikkonen said. "Too many cautions. Every time when I feel the car starts to work better then you have a caution and it takes a long time before the handling comes back."

Raikkonen twice hit the wall, and missed his call to pit the first time crew chief Rick Ren tried to bring him in. Ren, who is also the general manager of KBM, blamed it on the team chatter.

"There was too much talking going on the radio," Ren said. "I wanted to pit but everybody was on the radio. I've had experienced Cup guys do the same thing. It was no big deal."

Although Raikkonen wasn't sure of the rules for passing before the start/finish line on a restart, and was warned early in the race by NASCAR, Ren praised the driver.

"What impressed me more than anything was restarts, he didn't spin the tyres and was pushing people," Ren said. "I am wondering if F1 cars, they put down so much power that he's got a really good feel for when the tyres are slipping."

Overall, the experience was good, Raikkonen said, and he enjoyed all the interaction with fellow drivers who made a point to speak to him. There's no camaraderie in F1, and Montoya joked he probably spoke to Raikkonen more on Friday than he did the entire time the two were teammates.

"I just went to say 'Hi' and see how he was doing," Montoya said. "People did it to me here and I was really shocked, so if I can help, I will lend a hand."

It was the first time Montoya said he'd spoken to Raikkonen since Montoya walked away from his F1 ride in July, 2006. Montoya thought he was able to give KBM team members more assistance than he was Raikkonen.

"More the team than him, telling them why he's so loose and why he is struggling," Montoya said. "Our driving styles were a little bit different in Formula 1, but I know what he would like out of a car."

Source: F1Pulse.com

Keep working at it, Montoya tells Kimi Räikkönen

Just days before Kimi Räikkönen makes his NASCAR debut in the Camping World Truck Series race at Charlotte Motor Speedway on Friday, Juan Montoya offers some words of advice

The news of Kimi Räikkönen's try-out in NASCAR in the Camping World Truck Series first broke almost two months ago: and even after all this time, it still sounds like a bit of a huge April Fool's Day joke.

But on Friday, May 20 it becomes a reality as 2007 F1 world champion Kimi Räikkönen heads out onto Charlotte Motor Speedway to make his NASCAR series debut with the Kyle Busch Motorsports team.

The one current NASCAR Sprint Cup driver who has any idea of what's in store for Räikkönen is the driver who made a similar transition from the glamorous world of F1 to the more down-to-earth scene of American stock car racing - his former McLaren team mate Juan Pablo Montoya.

So what advice can the Colombian offer the new arrival from Finland?

"Keep working at it and listen to the advice people give you," says Montoya. "Ask questions and spend as much time behind the wheel, getting seat time, as you can."

Montoya knows what he's talking about: NASCAR hasn't come easy for him since he arrived in the series in 2007 after becoming disenchanted with the world of F1. He won the Sonoma road race in his rookie year and has since had three top-five and six top-10 finishes, and even become the first non-American to make it into the Chase at the end of the 2009 regular season. But oval victories and a Sprint Cup title still seem very far off for him.

"It'll be a tough transition but if he dedicates his time to [NASCAR], he should be okay," said Montoya. "He'll adjust after some time ... It's a big transition all around and just one of those things he'll need to get used to.

"He's a great race car driver but he'll need to learn to take care of his equipment in NASCAR. I know he likes to drive his cars hard and you can't do that over here."

Despite the fact that Montoya and Räikkönen entered F1 in the same year - 2001 - they came from very different backgrounds even then. Montoya had battled his way up through the US racing scene and won the Indy 500 race and the CART series title before moving to F1 as a very proven winner; Räikkönen on the other hand emerged out of nowhere, a karting star with unproven senior formula experience who needed special dispensation from the FIA to get a super-license to join Sauber. Within a year he had made a splash on the track and been snapped up by McLaren as "the next big thing", duly going on to win the world title with Ferrari in 2007 - something Montoya himself never did.

So what does Montoya think about Räikkönen's decision to try his hand at NASCAR Trucks?

"I think that it's cool that he's coming over to NASCAR. He's a cool guy and I think he will fit right in," he says, before offering a word of caution. "[But] my first choice wouldn't have been Charlotte [for a debut.] That's a tough track in general. I would've picked Talladega or Daytona before Charlotte."

Räikkönen will be under pressure straight away at Charlotte, with qualification carrying with it the potential for a very embarrassing public failure.

The news about Kimi's switch to NASCAR still leaves experienced motor sports journalists shaking their heads in wonder, not least because the US scene is notorious for the amount of media work required of its drivers who become almost full time corporate spokespeople for their sponsors.

"Both [Montoya and Räikkönen] suffer from lockjaw when it comes to the press, and neither is a fun interview," said Bob Varsha, longtime voice of F1 on the US sports channel SPEED, commenting on his scepticism about Räikkönen's decision to come to NASCAR. "I still find it odd, because he is such a reserved guy and hated dealing with the press in F1. That supposedly was one of his motivations for leaving the sport after winning the world championship.

"If Kimi knows anything about NASCAR, he knows NASCAR drivers are almost compelled to be gregarious, fan-friendly, work with the press and so on, which is completely unlike the Kimi those of us who have been involved with his career in F1 know."

One thing that's perceived to have held Montoya back in NASCAR is his difficulty in "playing nicely with others", as the sport often relies on on- and off-track alliances and partnerships. Montoya's still seen as very much something of a lone wolf, and Raikkonen could find himself in a similar situation.

"He was nicknamed 'Ice Man' when he raced in F1 so if that tells you anything!" laughs Montoya.

"Both are recognised as being incredibly brave and fast, said SPEED's Varsha. "But the key with both men is that neither enjoyed a reputation as either a team player or a technically astute driver ... If the car works as they need it to, they succeed. If it doesn't, working with the engineers to make it better was never something that seemed to interest them."

In the meantime, Kimi has been busy making sure that his "day job" over in the World Rally Championship doesn't feel unloved and unwanted by all the attention buzzing around his NASCAR debut.

"I wouldn't be doing any of the racing if it clashed with anything which I'm doing in the WRC," he emphasised to the WRC series website. "The races have been picked because they fit around the rallies I'm doing. It doesn't matter where I am when I'm not on the rallies."

Räikkönen, who recently finished sixth on Rally Jordan, says he's looking forward to his next WRC appearance, at the Acropolis Rally of Greece from 16-19 June. "The driving has been better and we're pushing harder now. My only target really is to improve in the WRC."

Meanwhile it looks like Räikkönen's NASCAR excursion might be starting a trend. His Finnish compatriot Mika Salo has reportedly told the Turun Sanomat (the same paper that broke the story of Kimi heading Stateside in March) newspaper that he's also set to try his hand at the NASCAR Camping World Truck Series.

"This year it is finally happening," the 44-year-old former Ferrari and Toyota driver is quoted as having told the Finnish publication, adding that he will make his series debut in July.

Another former F1 driver, Nelson Piquet Jr., has also been racing in the Truck Series since 2010 and in the last race took his best result so far with second at Nashville driving with Kevin Harvick Incorporated.

Source: Crash.net

Montoya says Räikkönen will fit right in

Formula 1 refugee and now established Nascar star Juan Pablo Montoya has said that Kimi Raikkonen would fit right into the stock car racing scene in the USA.

The former Williams and McLaren Formula 1 driver spoke to AP about Raikkonen’s Nascar ambitions, “The only thing that I heard is that he was being approved for Charlotte. I don’t know if he’s even confirmed he’s doing it,” Montoya said. “I think it would be cool if he comes here. He’s a cool guy and I think he would fit right in.”

Raikkonen is set to follow in the footsteps of ex-F1 drivers who have made the journey across the Atlantic including Montoya, Jacques Villeneuve, Scott Speed and Nelson Piquet.

Montoya and Raikkonen were team mates at McLaren in 2005 and 2006 and the Columbian who quit the Formula 1 midway through 2006 said, “I think maybe if you would get the numbers of how many people internationally are watching these races … in Europe and Asia, I think you would shock yourself. People in Formula One are very selfish. They think there is nothing better out there. But the actual racing, this is exciting.

He added, “It’s exciting to watch, it’s exciting to be here.”

Source: YallaF1

Montoya: Kimi welcome in NASCAR

Former F1 driver Juan Pablo Montoya reckons NASCAR would be good for Kimi Räikkönen and the Finn would be good for NASCAR

Räikkönen, who left F1 at the end of 2009 to move to the World Rally Championship, confirmed earlier this week that he would be embarking on a NASCAR career later this year.

The 31-year-old will take part in some Truck series events before moving on to the Nationwide and Sprint Cup series.

"I am excited about getting to know NASCAR world. I have been following it for a long time," the 1997 F1 World Champ told Finland's Turun Sanomat newspaper.

"I am 100 percent sure it will be fun and challenging.

" And already the Finn has been welcomed by former McLaren team-mate Montoya, who reckons his participation in NASCAR would be good for the sport.

"Well, people talk a lot and I've heard the story already before, but if he's definitely coming it would be really good for him and for the sport," Montoya, who swapped from F1 to NASCAR in 2006, told Autosport.

"He would be very welcome here."

Source: Planet-F1