Montoya third after San Marino Qualifying

Juan Pablo commented after qualifying by saying: "I think we've got a very good race car. I was actually lacking pace on new tyres and with the work we did it seemed to come to me a little bit. I'm very pleased to be honest. I think we have a very strong race car."

Pole was secured by BAR's Jenson Button, who was to claim his maiden pole position. His lap of 1m:19.753 was 0.258 seconds ahead of Ferrari's Michael Schumacher. Team-mate Rubens Barrichello was fourth joining Juan Pablo on the second row. The third row would be occupied by Ralf and Renault's Fernando Alonso.

Button's teammate Takuma Sato, Jaguar's Mark Webber, Renault driver Jarno Trulli and Cristiano Da Matta, of Toyota, completed the top-ten.

Both Kimi Raikkonen and Giancarlo Fisichella will begin from the back row of the grid after opting against setting lap times. They will e joined by Minardi driver Zsolt Baumgartner who spun at the Variante Alta and ended more than 25 seconds off the quickest time.

Raikkonen was to complete only an installation lap as the team was to swap his engine.