Montoya: Road America, not Infineon Raceway, a "real circuit"

Juan Pablo Montoya is the only NASCAR Sprint Cup Series driver to win a race at Infineon Raceway in Sonoma as a rookie. He won the Cup race in Sonoma in 2007.
Montoya has run his share of road courses in Formula One and the old Champ Car series.
While the Cup drivers were in Sonoma for one of two road courses races on the schedule, the Nationwide Series was at Road America, a road course in Wisconsin.
Montoya was asked if he would like to run a Cup car at Road America.
“I would rather run in Road America than here, to be honest. That's a real circuit,” Montoya said.
Montoya said it’s “awkward” for him to be on a road course in the Cup cars.
"Because there's just no grip. You know what I mean?” Montoya said. “The track by itself is really slow. It's just different. Put it that way."
Montoya was 12th fastest in the final Sprint Cup Series practice on Saturday. He will start 14th in Sunday’s Sprint Cup Series race in Sonoma.
As a driver who made the switch from open-wheel cars to stock cars, Montoya was asked about Danica Patrick running in the Izod IndyCar Series and NASCAR Nationwide Series at the same time. Patrick is coming off her best Indy car finish of the season, a second place at Texas Motor Speedway. She returns to the Nationwide Series at New Hampshire International Speedway on June 26.
"I thought she was starting to do really well,” Montoya said. “In the last race she ran, you could tell she was picking up the pace and was getting better. I don't know, it will be interesting to see what happens now. She only ran big tracks so now to go to a small one it's going to be different."


Photo: Juan Pablo Montoya said Road Ameica, not Infineon Raceway, is a real circuit. He would rather race there than at the road course in Sonoma, site of Sunday's NASCAR Sprint Cup Series race.

(Credit: Robert Laberge/Getty Images for NASCAR)