Is Juan Montoya’s Chase bid over?

October 24, 4:55 AMDetroit NASCAR ExaminerJosh Lobdell

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Montoya has a laugh while practicing at Martinsville Getty Images/Streeter Lecka

After last week’s debacle in Charlotte, does Juan Montoya have a chance at a Cup title? Well of course there is always a chance, but here that chance isn’t very good.

Not to take away anything from Montoya or his team, but this is going to come down to math. If we look at Jimmie Johnson’s record at the five remaining tracks we see there is almost no chance for Montoya to overcome his 195 point deficit.

Johnson has won six times at Martinsville, and finished in the top ten 93% of the time, so there is little chance for Montoya to make up points this week. That means, he would have to make up 50 or so points each of the next four weeks.

The next race on the schedule is Talladega, and that may be not only Juan’s best shot to make up points, but the rest of the chase field as well. Here Jimmie only finished in the top ten 40% of the time, and has only won win.

After that we have Texas, Phoenix, and Homestead. At Texas Jimmie finishes in the top ten 75% of the time, at Phoenix he is in the top ten 83% of the time and has won their three times.

While Homestead has not been the best track for Johnson, the chase may be over before then. While that is math that cannot be ignored, Juan and his crew have to go out each week and run as best as they can.

For Martinsville they qualified 21st, which is about his average, and he had a fast car during practice. This is his best track in the chase and has an average finish here of 12.6. So this is an opportunity race for Juan to prove once again he belongs among the NASCAR big dogs.

No one is saying Juan cannot win the title, the point here is Jimmie is so good at Chase racing that the math says he has virtually no shot. It is too bad really, as Juan could have made an excellent story, for a sport that kind of needs it right now.