It took a very long time for Montoya to finally take the centre on the podium. The best part of a full racing season, the victory coming in the 15th and the third last race of the year. A very long time considering that he was well on his way in the very third race of his fledgeling career in Brazil. And since then he has been deserted by Lady Luck on more occasions than anyone else, though Barrichello might run a close second on that score. And it took further bad luck for Barrichello to get Montoya the Italian Grand Prix. But then do you think any of the current breed of drivers has had a shorter climb to centre of the podium? Well think again - it took Mika Hakkinen over 100 starts to demonstrate his now characteristic crouching punch in the air. Now that Montoya has won his first race, I hope the jinx is finally broken and it will be racing factors rather than luck that will decide who wins a race. This win comes at a very crucial time, towards the fag end of the current season - had it been left to the next season, what I am about to say now would not have made much sense. We might have very well seen the 2002 Formula One Champion on the podium at Monza! And I sure am not talking about the Rs, Rubens or Ralf.

The reasons for my assessment are as follows:
Montoya finally seems to have gotten the hang of qualifying, taking his second successive pole position at Monza. He has done it under changing weather conditions at Spa as well. And his times have been well clear of not only the Ferraris and the McLarens but also his own team-mate Ralf Schumacher, who himself is a pretty good exponent of the flying lap. Next to take note of are Montoya's starts. Have you seen anyone start so cleanly and so explosively race after race, gaining upto five positions before the first lap is over. And if he starts from pole, do you think anyone can get ahead of him at the start?

Have you seen anyone start so cleanly and explosively race after race? And if he starts from pole, do you think anyone can get ahead of him at the start? Seen above is a picture we are going to see very often in the future!

Well, just imagine a scenario where someone else has a faster car and wants to get ahead of Montoya. He is already in big trouble and if you do not believe me ask one Michael Schumacher - the Italian GP at Monza being just one of the cases in point. Michael, who is a very aggressive driver took on the Williams of his brother without a second thought but did not even attempt to get past Montoya even though the Ferrari was clearly quicker than the Williams especially around the twisty parts of the circuit. Schumacher has learnt it the hard way, once risking to take the outside line past Montoya but never after that. And getting the right risk-free line past Montoya is definitely not going to be easy as the Colombian has proven that he can soak up the pressure lap after lap during so many Grands Prix, putting his car in just the right place to foil any overtaking attempts.

Even though he is very good at defensive driving, he is even better at aggressive driving. As far as overtaking manoeuvres go, he is a past master of the brilliant manoeuvre and has delivered the goods on even Michael Schumacher more than once this season. He would easily be one of the drivers who has overtaken the most number of cars this season - perhaps one of you can give me the statistics on that!

Well, that leaves us with his abilities in the wet and though we have not had a chance to see his prowess this season, I have every reason to believe that he will be one of the better drivers in the rains along with Michael Schumacher, Rubens Barrichello and the like.

The Williams car is coming into its own as are the Michelin tyres. Reliability of the BMW engine does not seem to be a problem any more and now on more than one occasion both the cars have made it to the finish line, both being on the podium in Italy. The power of the BMW engine no one can complain about as the car is clearly one of the fastest down the straights. It is now the development of the chassis that is catching up with the power of the engine to arrive at a very good overall package. I hope that the Michelin tyres will be on par with the Bridgestones by the start of the next season as it has often been the tyres that have let either Ralf or Juan-Pablo down on more than one occasion.

So it appears that though Montoya is my favourite for the next season by far, Michael Schumacher and Ferrari will remain his most serious rivals. Sadly McLaren seem to be on the wane and the three-way battle that we were expecting for the 2002 championship seems to be restricted to two.