Driver errors mask McLaren's true form

Coulthard's miserable form in the one-shot qualifying format continued when he made a mistake at the Variante della Roggia and condemned himself to an early start in tomorrow's final qualifying.

"I made a mistake at the second chicane," said the Scot. "The rear axle locked as a result of the automatic downshift cutting in and I had to drop my speed, which lost me a lot of time.

"We had a productive morning session. Overall I think we are in reasonable shape and if we have a trouble free session tomorrow we should qualify well."

Raikkonen made no obvious mistakes but felt he had been too conservative on his flying laps "I wanted to look after the car, but it wasn't as good a lap as it could've been and not as fast as this morning's, but we should be OK for tomorrow. Fifth place is not too bad, everything seems to be working well and I'm looking forward to the rest of the weekend."

Team principal Ron Dennis believes however that McLaren's form in the morning free practice session, where Raikkonen was third and Coulthard fifth, was a truer indication of its race potential.

He said: "Our drivers' comments sum up well the result of today's not so important qualifying session. The most vital part of the day was this morning's session, which confirmed to us that we should be competitive on Sunday."