Asked if he believed there was any way to hold off Donohue in the last hour of the Rolex 24 at Daytona International Speedway, Montoya shrugged and replied, "No."
He was right.
Donohue made a couple of unsuccessful tries to get past Montoya's Lexus Riley before finally making the pass 41 minutes from the end of the twice-around-the-clock event.
"I don't even remember the pass," Donohue said. "There was a lot of passing going on out there."
But the strong move, taking advantage of slower traffic that bogged the leader down, ended the hopes of the Chip Ganassi Racing team for an unprecedented fourth straight Rolex 24 victory as Montoya was unable to challenge Donohue the rest of the way.
The victory came on the 40th anniversary of a victory by Donohue's late father at Daytona.
It was the biggest career win for Donohue, who started from the pole on Saturday afternoon. He combined with former Indianapolis 500 winner Buddy Rice, Antonio Garcia and Darren Law to win by far the closest race in the history of the event.
"We ran hard the whole time" said Donohue, son of Indy 500 winner Mark Donohue, who died in 1975 after a crash during a Formula One test. The son was just eight years old at the time.
"It's a good story line but, to be perfectly honest, he's been gone for quite some time and our guys have done the hard work and putting in the effort to win this race," Donohue added. "I'm certainly really very proud of my father and his accomplishments and what he's done, and just coincidentally we happened to nail it on the 40th anniversary of his win.
"But I feel more of an attachment to the effort my guys have put in and Brumos ... That's where my heart is, to be honest."
Four Daytona Prototypes, including the third-place sister Brumos Porsche -- co-driven by six-time Daytona winner Hurley Haywood, J.C. France, son of NASCAR board member Jim France, Terry Borcheller and Joao Barbosa -- finished on the lead lap in an event that had only once before had two cars on the lead lap.
But the Ganassi drivers insisted that the Porsches had a big power advantage, particularly on the portion of the 3.56-mile road circuit that encompasses about three-fourths of the 21/2-mile NASCAR oval.
"I said before the race that if the Porsches don't have any problems they're going to beat us," said Montoya, who had combined with teammates Scott Pruett and Memo Rojas to win his first two Rolex 24s. "Every stint, apart from the last one, they drove away from us. We did what we could. I gave it 110 percent."
Donohue and his teammates pooh-poohed the supposed power advantage.
"There's no doubt we had good top end, but you really had to know how to use it," Donohue said, crediting former NASCAR driver and IROC test driver Dave Marcis with teaching him the art of passing on Daytona's high banks. "I've done a lot of testing here with the IROC guys.
"It's different cars, but the principles still apply. That's how I was able to do it, to be honest with you. I couldn't just sit there and drive by. You really had to plan it. It wasn't so easy. Juan protected the line so I had to really plan it and seize the opportunity when it surfaced."
Law called the Ganassi team's gripes sour grapes, noting, "They crossed the line 50 feet behind us and it was a fight the whole way through."
The winners completed 735 laps, a total of 2,616.6 miles.
Montoya replaced teammate Pruett in the cockpit of the Ganassi Lexus Riley with about 21/2 hours left and appeared to be in control after he took the lead during the 23rd hour.
A record 25 full-course cautions kept things close and the final yellow of the grueling race came out for debris with just over one hour to go. All four of the lead-lap cars took the opportunity to make their final pit stops.
Donohue replaced Garcia in the driver's seat of the No. 58 car during the stop and somehow managed to stay right behind Montoya as they left the pits.
When the green flag waved with 53 minutes to go, Donohue went after the more experienced Montoya, nearly passing him several times over a period of several laps. They nearly bumped at least once before Donohue finally took advantage of slower GT class traffic to slip past the Lexus into the lead on lap 710.
"It was just a matter of getting into some traffic at some point," Montoya said. "I was actually surprised to stay with them. I drove my butt off to see if they would make a mistake. They made a couple of mistakes, but their car was so comfortable for them there was nothing we could do."
Montoya chased Donohue to the finish but wound up just 0.167-seconds behind, a record, and only about four car-lengths back. The fourth-place Ford Dallara of Wayne Taylor, Max Angelelli, Pedro Lamy and Brad Friselle was only 7.589 seconds off the pace and in sight of the winners.
The previous closest 1-2 finish was 30.879 seconds in 2000 when a Dodge Viper held off a Chevrolet Corvette.
The second Ganassi entry, co-driven by IndyCar stars Scott Dixon and Dario Franchitti -- the fourth member of last year's winning team -- and Alex Lloyd, had problems in the early morning hours Sunday and wound up fifth, four laps behind the winners.
Donohue, Porsche stop Ganassi streak in Rolex 24
