“Was he not having fun?”: Dale Earnhardt Jr. expresses surprise over Juan Pablo Montoya’s NASCAR return

Dale Earnhardt Jr. recently spoke about Juan Pablo Montoya returning to NASCAR for a one-off race. Montoya would run in the #50 Toyota Camry of 23XI Racing at Watkins Glen. But the former F1 driver's return to stock car racing was something that surprised Earnhardt Jr.

Speaking on his podcast show, the Dale Jr. Download, Earnhardt pondered over why Montoya would want to come back to NASCAR. Montoya previously has had two stints with NASCAR on his resume, one between 2006-2009 and one between 2010-2014.

Monotya's return to Cup racing after a decade has left Dale Jr. "shocked."

"Juan Pablo Montoya will drive the #50 car for 23XI at Watkins Glen, what a shock that was. I was shocked. Why does Juan want to come back and race? Was he not having fun? Well, I’m excited about that," Junior said.

The NASCAR Hall of Famer further spoke about his admiration for Montoya's personality as he shared an anecdote from when the two were racing against each other. Dale Earnhardt Jr. claimed he "loved" Montoya and during their interactions in driver intros, he found him to be an easy to talk to and "a fun guy" to be around.

Junior described that as a driver, everyone had their qualms and complaints with NASCAR, which was also the case with Montoya.

"I would walk up to him and you’re a driver, right? So you think you know everything, you think you know everything that’s wrong with NASCAR and everybody’s got like 2-3 things going on that weekend that they’re pissed off about, that they think is stupid or we had to do this or do that or do something this way, and you’d go up to Juan and be like, ‘What’s up Juan?’ And he’d be like, ‘Yeah man, do you believe **mimics complaining*....' He’s just like us. I always enjoyed being around him," Earnhardt added.

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Dale Earnhardt Jr. got his hands on Juan Pablo Montoya's racecar from the infamous jet dryer incident

One of the most notable incidents from Juan Pablo Montoya's career in NASCAR was his jet dryer incident. During a caution at the Daytona 500 in 2012, Montoya ran into the jet dryer on the track and caused a massive fire which led to a two-hour-long red flag period.

Naturally, Montoya's racecar was beyond saving. But it still found a way into Dale Earnhardt Jr.'s personal collection of wrecked racecars.

This happened, as per SBNation, when Montoya's crew chief Chris Heroy offered Junior the infamous racecar from the jet dryer incident.

Speaking about being offered Montoya's wrecked car, Earnhardt said:

"(Heroy) is a buddy of mine, and he gave it to me. I got about 50 or 60 cars out there; I didn't buy any of 'em."

Dale Earnhardt Jr. loved having Montoya's car on his graveyard property and he deemed it as among the top two or three in his collection of wrecked racecars.