Montoya staying focused despite LMS heartbreaker (cont'd)

"You keep working and working and working," Hmiel said. "But it's a pretty grim task because you're standing there knowing that you've taken a car that was competitive and for no reason other than trying to be as competitive as you can be, you get torn up and now you're happy to be in the top 30 rather than in the top three.

"Suddenly you're relegated to where you are, and you have to have some intestinal fortitude and not look at the overall situation. It would be easy to say 'these guys [Johnson's team] are unbeatable' -- and they're an incredible race team -- but by the same token things can happen to anybody, so you've just got to keep your head down and keep doing what you're doing."

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But in the end the fact was that Montoya, whose four top-five finishes to start the Chase had never been achieved in five previous Chases, just as quickly has been erased from contention.

Chase leader and three-time defending champion Jimmie Johnson scored maximum points for his win. Montoya, who came into the race 58 points behind Johnson in third, fell three spots to sixth, a seemingly insurmountable 195 points behind.

Pattie was left to set the tone after Montoya took the checkered four laps down.

"We've got plenty of racing left," the Chase rookie crew chief said.

And Hmiel was even more emphatic as he praised Pattie and Montoya's crew.

"The same way of thinking is still going to prevail and we'll just keep trying hard to do the best that we can," Hmiel said. "These guys were on pins and needles all summer long, hoping to make the Chase. And then they made the Chase and there's about two minutes of terrific joy and satisfaction, and then you start worrying about how you're going to run in the Chase.

"So these kids have been under nothing but incredible pressure -- constantly. And then they start the Chase top-three, top-four, leading a race and you're like, 'holy cow, this might just happen.' And then you have a terrible day. I'm proud that those guys weren't reduced to tears."

And Montoya, who might have let out only one emotional yelp pleading for permission to pit when he realized how badly damaged his car was, immediately settled down and tried to make the best solution to his car's problems.

When he first exited the car, he was calm in his post-race analysis with team manager Tony Glover. And he was matter-of-fact in discussing what had happened, and what it meant.

"They all accelerated and they all checked up -- every time the No. 24 [Jeff Gordon] restarted it was the same thing -- I checked up and somebody didn't slow down and just ripped off the whole rear of the car," Montoya said. "Just one of those deals. It is what it is and you've just got to move on."

It was only when he was asked if a split-second occurrence on a single restart had become his team's worst-case scenario that Montoya seemed to be annoyed.

"[The worst-case scenario] for what?" Montoya said. "We made the Chase and up until [Saturday] we had four top-fives in a row and what's bad about it, you know what I mean? It's racing. If you're expecting to have 10 clean races then you're dreaming.

"We knew it could happen and here, always the restarts are an issue. I managed to slow down and I just got hit from behind. It happens."

Montoya acknowledged what his team's done so far and said he didn't expect that to change.

"Everybody on this car [Saturday] was pretty impressive," Montoya said. "We had one of our fastest cars. Not much we can do. We worked as hard as we could and we did all that we thought was possible and [Saturday] the best we could do was 35th.

"We were actually surprised. Everybody on the team is doing such a good job that even [Saturday] we had a faster car than [Johnson]. So, it happens. It's one of those racing things that will happen and we've just got to move on."

Video: Montoya goes for a spin | Post-race reactions