Montoya

[kdr]

that title caught your attention eh?

he must be the only driver out there who can complete the "indy500 monaco le mans" hat-trick. does he know...does he care?!

[Adam43]

I have never heard him mention Le Mans, but that is not to say he doesn't keep an eye on it.

I reckon he doesn't care, but in a good way. He may well do Le Mans one day, but for the fun rather than for the hat-trick.

I'd like to see him there, sharing with Raikkonen and Alonso.

[krt917]

Sounds good to me. I know it's an old complaint, but sometimes I REALLY wish some of the top GP guys ran in other series.

PS. How about Michael in the soon(ish)-to-be-launched Maserati!?

[gi_gav]

I'm still hopeful that Villeneuve will have a crack at Le Mans once he's finished with F1 (or once F1's finished with him...)

Indy 500, CART Champion, F1 WDC - a Le Mans win would be a great way to finish his career.

[BSchneiderFan]

Villeneuve has spoken of Le Mans before, and - my declining opinion of him notwithstanding - would still be a major coup for any front-running sportscar team, especially if, as I suspect, he won't be racing anywhere else in 2004.

Montoya certainly has driven some long-distance races in CART and at Indy, but I think Le Mans will be a long way off. Maybe after he's finished F1. After all, the guy just loves to race.

[Aysedasi]

Well, you can bet your bottom dollar that if Juan Pablo does got for the treble, my receding hair will be totally grey by then.....

[Fab]

True...

My bets are on Jacques, maybe after F1...

[Adam43]

Jacques. I don't know about. I've heard him be quite negative about Le Mans and also enthuse about it. Probably just depends what the jouralist feels like on the day!

[paul-collins]

Originally posted by kdr
he must be the only driver out there who can complete the "indy500 monaco le mans" hat-trick. does he know...does he care?!

I hadn't heard about this hat-trick until Motorsport ran a Graham Hill feature last year (March-ish). I had always understood that the F1 WDC was what Graham had considered part of the hat-trick, not Monaco. That's certainly the way Mario seems to view it.

Besides, I'd bet that if you asked Juan, he'd say he's still after the second part of the triple (WDC), so don't bother him with Le Mans yet.

Jacques has been pretty specific about someday wanting the triple. He tends to include the CART championship to puff up what his accomplishments would be. Of course, he'd still be competing with Mario if that were included. I'm sure he's had a lot of beers with his buddy Eddie while talking about driving in la Sarthe...

[gttouring]

I think that LeMans is a true drivers/Teams test The team does so much in preparation communication on track and car condition and rescueing. The drivers must be placed and spaced and raced tactfully. It is a true test of evry thing we love of AutoRacing,
Now if F1 would allow for more cross driving and teams would let the driver do a stint in an enduro I bet every series could benefit. If a marlboro maserati was driven by TGF and Barrihello and badoer in a 24 hr race once how fab would that be?
sponsor and advert laws should allow for this, as it is most likely the big hurdle here.

[Tim Northcutt]

After yesterday, Juan can always go to NASCAR....

I was at the "Trading Places" event at Indy yesterday...

The guy who surprised me was Jeff Gordon...he took less than a dozen laps and was running within a second of what Juan ran when he shook the Williams down for him....

I'd like to see Jeff run at LM someday as well...

[pirenzo]

They both managed to throw it off the road though!

Besides, i think Gordons best time is some 5s off last years pole...

[Jimeth]

hey come on tho he only did a handful of laps really! a proper f1 driver would have plenty of testing! don't take what Jeff did away from him, he's far more talented than most Nascar drivers.

[pirenzo]

I know, but we shouldn't jump to conclusions from that performance

[enemy-ace]

Originally posted by pirenzo
They both managed to throw it off the road though!

Besides, i think Gordons best time is some 5s off last years pole...

Michael Schumacher's best lap in '02 first practice was over 4seconds slower than his pole lap of that same year.
So considering Gordon's lack of experience with the car I would say he did a fantastic job.

[Tim Northcutt]

I was there, and I can tell you that Gordon was thrilled just to have the chance to pilot something high-tech (and he was smooth in it) and Juan was driving that 850 hp hog hard into the corners...smokin' the tires as he was braking to get into the corners...he was jamming gears and really throwing it solidly around the course....Juan is a true pro and a natural behind the wheel of anything that runs on four tires...

Juan said he had a good time...but Jeff told him up front as soon as it was over, "I'm sure my day was much more fun than yours was..."

[Chevyguy]

He should have been able to run the oval, like the Winston Cup cars are built to do. Pretty cool, though.

If you are thinking of any of the above drivers for Le Mans, think of Papis. Who would have guessed he would be with the same team at Sebring and Le Mans this year?

[Nick M]

Didn't Jeff Gordon switch from open wheel racing (can't recall what series but it rings a bell) to Nascar ?

Not taking away his achievement because it sounds mightily impressive. Especially if the track was "green" and hadn't been used for a while - that probably accounts for a whole chunk of time each lap.