[3] This year a peace and sport initiative was introduced on this Grand Prix under the High Patronage of Albert II, Prince of Monaco.

[5] Red Bull had a new two-tier diffuser ready for their RB5 car in Monaco, with chief designer Adrian Newey believing it could be a real benefit to the team.

Most other teams, including Toyota and BMW Sauber, had modified cars to give good downforce and high mechanical grip; important for the Monaco circuit's low speed and twisting, slow corners.

[8] This was in reference to proposed regulations by the FIA World Motor Sport Council to introduce a Budget Cap for 2010, and allow technical freedom to those teams operating under it.

The Thursday practice sessions began with Brawn GP establishing its dominance once again; Rubens Barrichello was fastest by three-tenths of a second from countryman Felipe Massa with a time of 1:17.199, and the two McLarens of Lewis Hamilton and Heikki Kovalainen following shortly thereafter.

The Brawns continued their form in the second session, placing third and fourth behind Nico Rosberg – who topped practice for the ninth time this season with a 1:15.243 – and Hamilton once again.

The second session saw the departure of the two Force Indias, both Toro Rossos and Nelson Piquet Jr.'s Renault while Finland's Kimi Räikkönen and Heikki Kovalainen topped the timing sheets.

The third and final session was dominated by Rubens Barrichello and Sebastian Vettel until a late lap from Jenson Button saw the championship leader take his fourth pole from six starts this season with Kimi Räikkönen the highest-placed KERS-equipped car in second place.

This provided an advantage, as the super-soft tyres – which had proven to be the better of the two all weekend – started to lose grip drastically after twelve laps as championship contender Sebastian Vettel proved when he started losing up to four seconds per lap on leader Button, because of the difficulty in overtaking at Monaco, this greatly helped the Brawn GP drivers and Kimi Räikkönen (the only three drivers ahead of Vettel when his tyres started to lose grip), because for several minutes all cars behind him found themselves unable to overtake, opening a huge gap between third and fourth, even for several laps after Vettel had been overtaken.

After the end of the race, Button mistakenly parked his car in parc fermé in the pit lane as is normal for other Grands Prix, rather than on the main straight with the other two podium finishers as is the norm for Monaco.