Is it possible to have Grub2's boot.img in the MBR and have it load core.img from a separate boot partition?

Is it possible to have Grub2's boot.img in the MBR and have it load core.img from a separate boot partition?

I have a multiboot system that I would like to use Grub to manage. The version of Grub shipping with my Linux distro is Grub2, and it installs its equivalent of stage 1.5-2, core.img, into the remaining sectors on the first track after the MBR but before the first partition. Unfortunately, those sectors are needed by another program.