Monday 5 January 2009

Happy Birthday, Franck Montagny!


Today is French racing driver Franck Montagny's 31st birthday. Why am I singling this out in particular. Over my time at Sidepodcast, Christine has taken a liking to him after seeing him at the Goodwood Festival of Speed in 2007 when he was still with Toyota as a test driver and noting he was just wandering about not doing anything special in particular because, well, I guess no-one really knew who he was.

Still, since his F1 testing days, he has gone on to bigger and better things. He produced a fantastic drive at last year's Le Mans 24 Hours for Peugeot, driving long stints at a brilliantly fast pace. His car could have even won the event had it not been for the incompetence of Christian Klien putting it in the gravel during the night. Still, he managed 3rd which is something to be proud of. He also came 2nd in his first Champ Car race last year as well, which was ironically the final race for the formula ever before the IndyCar Series took over, been a race winner for Acura in the American Le Mans Series AND raced for Team France in A1GP! Boy, does he get around or what!

Next season, we all hope it will be success all the way for Franck, who I actually class to be one of the best French drivers in the world right now, second only to Sebastien Loeb who quite frankly can drive anything with 4 wheels and beat the pants off of anyone around. But for now, here's to Mr Montagny reaching 31 years on this earth. Many happy returns, Franck, and all the best for 2009!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

i think we need to encourage franck to do the RoC next year. what say you?

Woodwiss_F1 said...

Sounds like an excellent idea. Franck and Loeb would be an awesome partnership.

Anonymous said...

You can have a word when we stalk... I mean spot him at Autosport.

Woodwiss_F1 said...

I can't make it to Autosport this year, remember? :( Or were you talking to Mr C?

Anonymous said...

Apologies, Scott. I did blockquote, but it seems to have disappeared into the ether.