The 1987 Austrian Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Österreichring on 16 August 1987. It was the tenth race of the 1987 Formula One World Championship. It was the twentieth Austrian Grand Prix, and the last to be held until . The race was run over 52 laps of the circuit for a total race distance of , also being the last race in the original track.
The race needed to be restarted twice following crashes on the starting grid. It was eventually won by British driver Nigel Mansell, driving a Williams-Honda. Mansell took his third victory of the season by 56 seconds from Brazilian teammate Nelson Piquet, with Italian Teo Fabi third in a Benetton-Ford.
Race summary The race was plagued with accidents. The first major incident came when Stefan Johansson hit a deer with his McLaren MP4/3 after it wandered onto the circuit during Friday practice. The terrified deer was crossing the track to seek refuge from the noise of the cars when it was struck by Johansson traveling at close to , killing it instantly. The McLaren left front suspension was broken in the impact causing it to spear off into the guardrail and all four corners of the car, as well as the carbon fibre monocoque were destroyed. Johansson was fortunate to escape with little more than a headache, though he was later flown by helicopter to a hospital in Klagenfurt for x-rays after complaining of headaches and neck pains. His crash caused McLaren to have to fly a spare car overnight from the team's base in Woking. Nelson Piquet's Williams-Honda had collided with the AGS of Pascal Fabre, ending with the Williams impacting in the wall.
Qualifying Pos No Driver Constructor Q1 Q2 Gap 1 6 Nelson Piquet Williams-Honda 1:23.357 1:49.991 — 2 5 Nigel Mansell Williams-Honda 1:23.459 1:33.779 +0.102 3 28 Gerhard Berger Ferrari 1:24.213 1:38.388 +0.856 4 20 Thierry Boutsen Benetton-Ford 1:24.348 1:48.124 +0.991 5 19 Teo Fabi Benetton-Ford 1:25.054 no time +1.697 6 27 Michele Alboreto Ferrari 1:25.077 1:45.518 +1.720 7 12 Ayrton Senna Lotus-Honda 1:25.492 1:39.647 +2.135 8 7 Riccardo Patrese Brabham-BMW 1:25.766 1:53.119 +2.409 9 1 Alain Prost McLaren-TAG 1:26.170 1:43.132 +2.813 10 8 Andrea de Cesaris Brabham-BMW 1:27.672 no time +4.315 11 17 Derek Warwick Arrows-Megatron 1:27.762 no time +4.405 12 18 Eddie Cheever Arrows-Megatron 1:28.370 1:37.908 +5.013 13 11 Satoru Nakajima Lotus-Honda 1:28.786 1:43.002 +5.429 14 2 Stefan Johansson McLaren-TAG 1:29.003 1:41.711 +5.646 15 24 Alessandro Nannini Minardi-Motori Moderni 1:29.435 1:49.566 +6.078 16 25 René Arnoux Ligier-Megatron 1:29.733 no time +6.376 17 9 Martin Brundle Zakspeed 1:29.893 1:42.383 +6.536 18 26 Piercarlo Ghinzani Ligier-Megatron 1:30.682 no time +7.325 19 23 Adrián Campos Minardi-Motori Moderni 1:30.797 1:47.128 +7.440 20 10 Christian Danner Zakspeed 1:31.015 1:48.880 +7.658 21 21 Alex Caffi Osella-Alfa Romeo 1:32.313 1:50.273 +8.956 22 30 Philippe Alliot Lola-Ford 1:33.741 1:48.595 +10.384 23 16 Ivan Capelli March-Ford 1:34.199 1:54.807 +10.842 24 3 Jonathan Palmer Tyrrell-Ford 1:34.619 1:49.308 +11.262 25 4 Philippe Streiff Tyrrell-Ford 1:35.338 1:51.624 +11.981 26 14 Pascal Fabre AGS-Ford 1:40.633 1:57.236 +17.276Source:
Race Two Start line accidents The race started at 2:30 pm Central European Time (UTC+1). The first race start ended quickly after the Zakspeed of Martin Brundle crashed, then the two Tyrrells of Jonathan Palmer and Philippe Streiff collided in the ensuing chaos with Piercarlo Ghinzani also crashing his Ligier. The second attempt to start was more serious. Mansell on the front row crawled away with clutch problems and the grid compacted behind him. The Österreichring's narrow front straight saw to the rest when Eddie Cheever (Arrows) and Riccardo Patrese (Brabham) collided and half the grid, including Johansson, Alex Caffi (Osella), Ivan Capelli (March), Pascal Fabre, Philippe Alliot (Larrousse-Lola), and both Zakspeeds of Brundle and Christian Danner were involved in the ensuing pile-up.
Restart For the third start Streiff was missing as Tyrrell had simply run out of usable cars and Palmer got the use of the surviving DG016 as he had qualified higher than his team mate (exactly the reverse of the situation earlier in the year in Belgium when Palmer was forced to sit out the restart with both race Tyrrells wrecked, Streiff got the spare as he had qualified ahead of Palmer). Several drivers were in repaired cars or in spare cars, including Ayrton Senna after a CV joint failed in his Lotus during the second start. The third start, over two hours late, continued to claim cars. Alain Prost (McLaren) had an electrical failure as the warm-up lap began. The team mechanics got the car going and Prost started from the pitlane along with Senna and the Ferrari of Michele Alboreto. The third attempt to start had no problems although Johansson soon pitted with a puncture then had a tyre fall off on his out lap after a chaotic pitstop. Johansson made it back to the pits and resumed.
Piquet led early from Thierry Boutsen in his Benetton and Mansell. Boutsen pitted with gear linking problems and Mansell leapt past Piquet while negotiating lapped cars on the straight leading into the Bosch Kurve. Fabi (Benetton) was a lap down in third ahead of Boutsen in a season best result for the team. Recovering from their difficulties, Senna, Prost and Johansson finished fifth, sixth and seventh. Ghinzani was eighth for Ligier ahead of Danner and René Arnoux in the second Ligier. Sixteen cars finished although Fabre had not completed enough laps to be classified and 14th placed Brundle would be disqualified for a bodywork infringement on the spare Zakspeed 871, pressed into service after the startline collisions.
Classification Numbers in brackets refer to positions of naturally aspirated entrants competing for the Jim Clark Trophy. Pos No Driver Constructor Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 5 Nigel Mansell Williams-Honda 52 1:18:44.898 2 9 2 6 Nelson Piquet Williams-Honda 52 + 55.704 1 6 3 19 Teo Fabi Benetton-Ford 51 + 1 Lap 5 4 4 20 Thierry Boutsen Benetton-Ford 51 + 1 Lap 4 3 5 12 Ayrton Senna Lotus-Honda 50 + 2 Laps 7 2 6 1 Alain Prost McLaren-TAG 50 + 2 Laps 9 1 7 2 Stefan Johansson McLaren-TAG 50 + 2 Laps 14 8 26 Piercarlo Ghinzani Ligier-Megatron 50 + 2 Laps 18 9 10 Christian Danner Zakspeed 49 + 3 Laps 20 10 25 René Arnoux Ligier-Megatron 49 + 3 Laps 16 11 (1) 16 Ivan Capelli March-Ford 49 + 3 Laps 23 12 (2) 30 Philippe Alliot Lola-Ford 49 + 3 Laps 22 13 11 Satoru Nakajima Lotus-Honda 49 + 3 Laps 13 9 Martin Brundle Zakspeed 48 Bodywork infringement 17 14 (3) 3 Jonathan Palmer Tyrrell-Ford 47 + 5 Laps 24 14 Pascal Fabre AGS-Ford 45 + 7 Laps 26 7 Riccardo Patrese Brabham-BMW 43 Engine 8 27 Michele Alboreto Ferrari 42 Turbo 6 8 Andrea de Cesaris Brabham-BMW 35 Engine 10 17 Derek Warwick Arrows-Megatron 35 Engine 11 18 Eddie Cheever Arrows-Megatron 31 Tyre 12 28 Gerhard Berger Ferrari 5 Turbo 3 23 Adrián Campos Minardi-Motori Moderni 3 Electrical 19 24 Alessandro Nannini Minardi-Motori Moderni 1 Engine 15 21 Alex Caffi Osella-Alfa Romeo 0 Electrical 21 4 Philippe Streiff Tyrrell-Ford 0 Accident 25
Championship standings after the race
Drivers' Championship standings PosDriverPoints 1 Nelson Piquet 54 2 Ayrton Senna 43 3 Nigel Mansell 39 4 Alain Prost 31 5 Stefan Johansson 19Source:
Constructors' Championship standings Pos Constructor Points 1 Williams-Honda93 2 McLaren-TAG50 3 Lotus-Honda49 4 Ferrari17 5 Benetton-Ford15Source:
Jim Clark Trophy standings PosDriverPoints 1 Jonathan Palmer 61 2 Philippe Streiff 45 3 Pascal Fabre 35 4 Philippe Alliot 25 5 Ivan Capelli 19
Colin Chapman Trophy standings Pos Constructor Points 1 Tyrrell-Ford106 2 AGS-Ford35 3 Lola-Ford25 4 March-Ford19
Note: Only the top five positions are included for all four sets of standings.
References