The 1987 Mexican Grand Prix was a Formula One motor race held at Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez in Mexico City on 18 October 1987. It was the fourteenth race of the 1987 Formula One World Championship. It was the 11th Mexican Grand Prix and the second since the Autódromo Hermanos Rodríguez was renovated and returned to the World Championship calendar.
The race was held over a total of 63 laps of the circuit for a race distance of . The race was divided into two heats after British driver Derek Warwick crashed his Arrows A10 heavily exiting the high-speed Peraltada corner on lap 31 after a rear suspension failure; the Arrows car's rear suspension was weakened by Satoru Nakajima crashing his Lotus-Honda straight into the back of Warwick's car at the end of the main straight earlier in the race. The results of the first 30 laps were combined with the results of the second race of 33 laps to create a combined result.
The race was won by British driver Nigel Mansell driving a Williams FW11B. Mansell's combined time over the 63 laps was 26 seconds faster than his Brazilian teammate and eventual 1987 World Champion, Nelson Piquet. Piquet actually took the chequered flag first at the end of the second heat, but Mansell's lead over Piquet at the time of Warwick's accident was substantially larger. Piquet had been delayed after a collision with Alain Prost (McLaren MP4/3) on the first lap.
It was Mansell's sixth and last Grand Prix victory for the 1987 season. Riccardo Patrese finished third driving a Brabham BT56. It was Patrese's best result since finishing third in the 1984 Italian Grand Prix. It was just the second podium of the year for Brabham. Brabham would only score one more podium before it would fold in 1992.
Attrition bit heavily into the race with just fifteen cars taking the second race start. Nine survived to the finish. Naturally aspirated Jim Clark Trophy cars climbed into the points with Philippe Alliot (Lola LC87) taking his third top six result for the year.
Ayrton Senna was fined $15,000 for punching a corner marshal after they refused to push his stalled car.
Mansell's victory allowed him to close to within twelve points of his championship leading teammate. With just two races left, only the Williams drivers had enough points to win the championship.
Classification During Saturday morning's 90 minute free practice session, a number of the turbo teams ran their cars at the 2.5 bar boost limit that would be enforced in . To the surprise of many, lap times actually proved faster than they would in the afternoon's qualifying session when the cars were running their full 4.0 bar boost settings with BBC commentator Murray Walker later attributing it to the fact that at 2.5 bar the drivers had more useable power whereas the high horsepower figures ( was largely wasted in anything but a straight line where the faster turbo cars were regularly speed trapped at over on the circuit's long main straight during qualifying.
Qualifying Pos No Driver Constructor Q1 Q2 Gap 1 5 Nigel Mansell Williams-Honda 1:20.696 1:18.383 2 28 Gerhard Berger Ferrari 1:19.992 1:18.426 +0.043 3 6 Nelson Piquet Williams-Honda 1:20.701 1:18.463 +0.080 4 20 Thierry Boutsen Benetton-Ford 1:20.766 1:18.691 +0.308 5 1 Alain Prost McLaren-TAG 1:20.572 1:18.742 +0.359 6 19 Teo Fabi Benetton-Ford 1:22.666 1:18.992 +0.609 7 12 Ayrton Senna Lotus-Honda 1:21.361 1:19.089 +0.706 8 7 Riccardo Patrese Brabham-BMW 1:21.720 1:19.889 +1.506 9 27 Michele Alboreto Ferrari 1:21.290 1:19.967 +1.584 10 8 Andrea de Cesaris Brabham-BMW 1:22.930 1:20.141 +1.758 11 17 Derek Warwick Arrows-Megatron 1:23.347 1:21.664 +3.281 12 18 Eddie Cheever Arrows-Megatron 1:24.445 1:21.705 +3.322 13 9 Martin Brundle Zakspeed 1:25.184 1:21.711 +3.328 14 24 Alessandro Nannini Minardi-Motori Moderni 1:26.055 1:22.035 +3.652 15 2 Stefan Johansson McLaren-TAG 1:22.185 1:22.382 +3.802 16 11 Satoru Nakajima Lotus-Honda 1:23.750 1:22.214 +3.831 17 10 Christian Danner Zakspeed 1:23.992 1:22.593 +4.210 18 25 René Arnoux Ligier-Megatron 1:24.299 1:23.053 +4.670 19 23 Adrián Campos Minardi-Motori Moderni 1:27.798 1:23.955 +5.572 20 16 Ivan Capelli March-Ford 1:27.161 1:24.404 +6.021 21 26 Piercarlo Ghinzani Ligier-Megatron 1:27.059 1:24.553 +6.170 22 3 Jonathan Palmer Tyrrell-Ford 1:27.306 1:24.723 +6.340 23 29 Yannick Dalmas Lola-Ford 1:28.156 1:24.745 +6.362 24 30 Philippe Alliot Lola-Ford 1:27.184 1:25.096 +6.713 25 4 Philippe Streiff Tyrrell-Ford 1:27.011 1:26.305 +7.922 26 21 Alex Caffi Osella-Alfa Romeo 1:27.670 1:30.010 +9.287 14 Pascal Fabre AGS-Ford 1:30.285 1:28.655 +10.272Source:
Race Numbers in brackets refer to positions of normally aspirated entrants competing for the Jim Clark Trophy. Pos No Driver Constructor Laps Time/Retired Grid Points 1 5 Nigel Mansell Williams-Honda 63 1:26:24.207 1 9 2 6 Nelson Piquet Williams-Honda 63 + 26.176 3 6 3 7 Riccardo Patrese Brabham-BMW 63 + 1:26.879 8 4 4 18 Eddie Cheever Arrows-Megatron 63 + 1:41.352 12 3 5 19 Teo Fabi Benetton-Ford 61 + 2 laps 6 2 6 (1) 30 Philippe Alliot Lola-Ford 60 + 3 laps 24 1 7 (2) 3 Jonathan Palmer Tyrrell-Ford 60 + 3 laps 22 8 (3) 4 Philippe Streiff Tyrrell-Ford 60 + 3 laps 25 9 (4) 29 Yannick Dalmas Lola-Ford 59 + 4 laps 23 12 Ayrton Senna Lotus-Honda 54 Clutch 7 16 Ivan Capelli March-Ford 51 Water leak 20 21 Alex Caffi Osella-Alfa Romeo 50 Engine 26 26 Piercarlo Ghinzani Ligier-Megatron 43 Water leak 21 23 Adrián Campos Minardi-Motori Moderni 32 Transmission 19 25 René Arnoux Ligier-Megatron 29 Overheating 18 17 Derek Warwick Arrows-Megatron 26 Accident 11 8 Andrea de Cesaris Brabham-BMW 22 Accident 10 28 Gerhard Berger Ferrari 20 Turbo 2 20 Thierry Boutsen Benetton-Ford 15 Electrical 4 24 Alessandro Nannini Minardi-Motori Moderni 13 Turbo 14 27 Michele Alboreto Ferrari 12 Engine 9 9 Martin Brundle Zakspeed 3 Turbo 13 2 Stefan Johansson McLaren-TAG 1 Collision 15 11 Satoru Nakajima Lotus-Honda 1 Collision 16 10 Christian Danner Zakspeed 1 Collision 17 1 Alain Prost McLaren-TAG 0 Collision 5
Championship standings after the race
Drivers' Championship standings PosDriverPoints 1 Nelson Piquet 73 (76) 2 Nigel Mansell 61 3 Ayrton Senna 51 4 Alain Prost 46 5 Stefan Johansson 26Source:
Constructors' Championship standings Pos Constructor Points 1 Williams-Honda137 2 McLaren-TAG72 3 Lotus-Honda57 4 Ferrari26 5 Benetton-Ford22Source:
Jim Clark Trophy standings PosDriverPoints 1 Jonathan Palmer 77 2 Philippe Streiff 68 3 Philippe Alliot 43 4 Ivan Capelli 38 5 Pascal Fabre 35
Colin Chapman Trophy standings Pos Constructor Points 1 Tyrrell-Ford145 2 Lola-Ford43 3 March-Ford38 4 AGS-Ford35
References