Trulli qualified in seventh position but a penalty for Michael Schumacher saw the pole position man sent to the back of the grid, meaning that Jarno and Ralf Schumacher started sixth and tenth on the grid for F1’s showpiece event.

Both men were debuting the team’s new TF106B chassis and both adopted one-stop strategies. But after a hydraulic problem halted Trulli it was left to Schumacher to salvage something for the team as he claimed the final point for eighth place.

“This is really disappointing,” Trulli said. “I have had a lot of problems this year and it looked like I was going to score a podium but for the second successive year here, I had a problem. Monte Carlo is also a frustrating race because you spend so much time in traffic and you don't get any clear laps to drive at your full potential. I was in traffic most of the way this afternoon but towards the end the car felt good and I was comfortably controlling the situation before my problem.”

Schumacher added: “That was a difficult race. I had an extra set of tyres for the race and was hoping to make up a couple of places at the start, but that’s not the way it worked out. I ended up spending most of the day in traffic and that put paid to our hopes. On the positive side I at least managed to score a point but we thought we could achieve more today.”

Reigning world champion Fernando Alonso took his first Monte Carlo win for Mild Seven Renault, fighting a close battle for much of the race with Team McLaren Mercedes driver Kimi Raikkonen. The Finn ultimately retired and it was left to team mate Juan Pablo Montoya to take second place. David Coulthard scored the first ever podium finish for Red Bull Racing and appeared on the podium, next to His Highness Prince Albert, wearing a Superman cape! Rubens Barrichello was fourth for Lucky Strike Honda and Michael Schumacher drove through the field to finish right on his tail after starting his Ferrari from the pit lane. Giancarlo Fisichella was sixth in the second Renault, with Heidfeld and Ralf’s TF106B claiming the final points.

Toyota’s Pascal Vasselon summarised: “To say that we are disappointed would be a huge understatement. There was a hydraulic problem on Jarno’s car that we need to look further into, and with Ralf we were unfortunate. Our starts were not good and we will work hard on that, but the one-stop strategy with both cars was the right one.”

The championship now heads for the British Grand Prix at Silverstone in a fortnight’s time, the British race one month earlier than usual and heightening the ever-present danger of rain in the UK and the need for Bridgestone’s wet tyres for the first time in 2006.