Qualifying: JPM in league of his own

Ralf Schumacher lines up fourth in his Williams, but he finished the hour-long session 0.625s behind his team mate. As for McLaren-Mercedes, it sits in the wilderness, with David Coulthard sixth behind Jarno Trulli's flamboyantly driven Jordan-Honda and Mika Hakkinen seventh after a heavy accident at the second Lesmo that red-flagged the session with four minutes still to run.

Luckily the Finn was able to walk away, but with just three races to go before commencing his 'sabbatical', it was a wake-up call for the former double world champion. The car went wide onto the kerb, slewed to the inside, then bit and turned into the outside barrier, hitting almost head-on and losing a left front wheel in the impact. The session was stopped for 15 minutes while the track was cleared of debris.

Montoya had taken pole briefly with 25 minutes of the session gone, but that was snatched back by Schumacher Sr. Then, with 23 minutes to go, Montoya re-took the top spot with a 1m22.431s flier. Nobody got near to that time, but just to make sure, he then banged in an even quicker lap 10 minutes later, stopping the clocks at 1m22.216s. After the red flag period, he went out again and narrowly missed improving it further by just 55 thousandths of a second.

Track temperatures had risen to 28 degrees for qualifying, letting Michelin's rubber do its stuff in its preferred temperature range, and BMW's powerful V10 is in its element on Monza's flat-out straights, but the Montoya factor shouldn't be discounted - as Ralf's times proved.

"That was pretty good," understated Montoya. "We worked hard to make the car better and better, and as the temperatures rose, that helped us too. I'm very pleased with the car. It's going to be quite an interesting race. If I have a clean start, we'll just go from there."

Schumacher Sr went for a last-gasp attempt on pole, but his best lap had been spoilt by a moment in the final sector. However, Barrichello didn't just capitalise on his mistake and had looked genuinely quick in his own right.

"I had to push hard to try for the pole and I just overdid it," shrugged Schumacher. "My mistake in the final sector killed the overall lap time."

Barrichello was happy to be able to deliver the goods in front of the tifosi and didn't discount beating the flying Williams over a race distance: "There's a long race ahead," he noted. "We had a great car today and hopefully we'll have a great time in the race."

Behind Hakkinen, Sauber-Petronas took the eighth and ninth slots, but with Nick Heidfeld edging the soon-to-be McLaren driver Kimi Raikkonen. A point proven?

Pedro de la Rosa again outqualified his Jaguar Racing team-leader Eddie Irvine, taking the 10th grid slot, and to rub salt into the Ulsterman's wounds, Jenson Button's Benetton-Renault and Heinz-Harald Frentzen's Prost-Acer were between them in 11th and 12th.

For Button, this is an important weekend, with team boss Flavio Briatore imploring the Englishman to start delivering the goods. Flav hasn't come out and actually said Button's drive is in danger, but one can read a lot into his statements so far. Qualifying three slots ahead of team mate Giancarlo Fisichella was a good thing to do therefore.

With BAR-Honda lacking race engineer Jock Clear so far this weekend - he remains stranded in New York - the team struggled to 15th and 17th, with Jacques Villeneuve ahead of Olivier Panis.

Prost rookie Tomas Enge got himself into his debut Grand Prix in 20th on the grid. The Czech had to resort to the team's spare after engine problems, but still outpaced both Minardis, which had a farcical beginning to their session.

Both Minardis left the pits at the start of the session, but both then coasted to a halt at the first chicane. Team boss Paul Stoddart blamed a continuation of the gearbox software problem that had hampered their morning running.

Both drivers were obliged to qualify in the spare, which was not fitted with the same new but troublesome gearbox of the race cars. Under the circumstances, it was a fine effort for the weekend's other debutant, Malaysia's Alex Yoong, to get within the 107 percent qualifying benchmark, albeit 22nd and last.

Here's a fact for you... This is only the second time since the inception of the F1 World Championship in 1950 that two drivers from two countries that have never had a GP driver before have made their debut in the same race. Those two drivers are Tomas Enge from the Czech Republic and Alex Yoong from Malaysia. The first time? That very first points-scoring race, the 1950 British GP at Silverstone.

For full qualifying results, click here.