The 1987 24 Hours of Le Mans was the 55th Grand Prix of Endurance as well as the fifth round of the 1987 World Sports-Prototype Championship. It took place at the Circuit de la Sarthe, France, on the 13 and 14 June 1987. Jaguar was a strong contender, have won the four preceding rounds of the Championship. The Porsche works team had installed a new 3-litre engine into their 962s but their turbo engines would test their fuel economy.
Practice had been hampered by poor weather, and was notable for a big accident to Price Cobb who wrote off the third works Porsche. The rain continued into the race day and only eased as the race got underway. A chaotic first hour saw most teams diving into the pits to change off their rain-tyres. There was also a serious problem with the standard-grade fuel. Dropping from 105-octane, it played havoc with the engine-management systems of the Porsche turbo-engines, and the fancied teams from Joest and Kremer lost their cars with holed pistons. The second works Porsche was also afflicted, leaving just the single car hounded by the three Jaguars. Along with the Richard Lloyd car, these five cars jockeyed for position over the first quarter of the race, regularly swapping places. Rain returned as darkness fell, and a safety car came out when the Lloyd car caught fire at Mulsanne corner. Bell, Stuck and Holbert gradually pulled out a lead as the Jaguars had issues. Another safety came out when Win Percy had a huge accident on the Hunaudières straight. A tyre on his Jaguar blew out as he approached Mulsanne at over 350 kp/h. The car rolled and disintegrated, but Percy was able to walk away unhurt. The race resumed two hours later as dawn was breaking, removing any fuel concerns for the Porsches. The Jaguars both failed in the morning and suddenly the Porsche was out on its own, with a fifteen lap lead. From there it was a simple coast to the finish giving Bell, Holbert and Stuck consecutive victories. The small Obermaier Racing team had a reliable race and survived the attrition for a fine second place, with local owner-driver Yves Courage third in his Cougar. Gordon Spice had a similarly convincing victory in the C2 class in his Spice-Fiero, finishing sixth overall over the Ecurie Ecosse, who in turn won the Index for Energy Efficiency. The twelve classified finishers was the smallest number since 1970.
Regulations The FIA (Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile) aligned the Group C safety regulations with IMSA. The foot-pedals now had to be in a reinforced box and placed behind the front axle. Pushed by Jaguar and Walkinshaw, they also downgraded the fuel used from 105- to 98-octane Spurring 2012, p.273Hodges 1987, p.155 and removing toluene and other special fuel additives.Wimpffen 2008, p.225 This would certainly impact the turbocharged Porsches to the level of around 20 bhp.
After the small adjustment to the Mulsanne corner last year, there was a much more significant change this year at the Dunlop Curve. The long right-hand bend was the first corner after the start-finish line and led up to the Esses section and Tertre Rouge. International motorcycle races used the shorter Bugatti Circuit. At the request of the FIM (Fédération Internationale de Motocyclisme) to reduce speeds approaching the Esses (where the Bugatti Circuit deviated away), the Dunlop Curve was tightened and a chicane installed just before the brow of the hill and the iconic Dunlop bridge. The net effect increased the overall circuit length by only 7 metres and increase lap-times by around 4–5 seconds.Williams 2023, p.313 The département also resurfaced the section from the Indianapolis corner to the Porsche curves. Once again, the ACO (Automobile Club de l'Ouest) arranged a test day in mid-May. Of the prospective field of 50, only 23 cars arrived. Finally, the previous year's race had an English radio commentary broadcast locally on a limited basis. This year, Radio Le Mans was sponsored by the Silk Cut Jaguar team and Autosport magazine. It provided informed race-commentary for the legion of British fans onsite for the race, albeit not running right through the night, and would go on to become an established feature of the event.Clarke 1997, p.82 Road & Track Nov 1987
Entries The five works manufacturers from the previous year returned to Le Mans, headlined by the showdown between Porsche and Jaguar. Indeed, Porsche could have been considered the underdogs after the dominant display by Jaguar, winning all four Championship races in the season to date. However, Porsche are masters of Le Mans and Jaguar still unproven over 24 hours of racing. The colloquial expression that "Le Mans is a British race held in France" was quite relevant, as 30-35000 British fans surged to the track for the big race,Hodges 1987, p.159 estimated to be around a quarter of the total spectators.
There were also three racing manufacturers each in C1 (WM, Sauber and Cougar) and C2 (Ecosse, Spice and ALD). The IMSA-GTP class would be a works contest between the Mazda rotaries and the Porsche four-wheel drive. With the dwindling field of GT interest and a full entry-list of prototypes, the ACO took no Group B entries. It was thus the first year with no cars homologated for production in the field since the class differentiation started in 1959.Williams 2023, p.314
Class Quantity Turbo/Rotaryengines Group C1 31 / 26 25 / 22 IMSA-GTP 4 / 3 4 / 3 Group C2 25 / 19 7 / 5 Total Entries 60 / 48 36 / 30 Note: The first number is the number accepted, the second the number who started.
Group C1 This year the Rothmans Porsche works team arrived with an improved car ahead, not yet released to their customer teams. Their 962 now sported a fully water-cooled 3-litre engine. The chassis also changed from a 16"/19" front-rear wheel diameter to 16" all round, to allow more air to the redesigned, and lower, rear-wing.Spurring 2012, p.275 Despite that, it was apparent that the width of the flat-six engine precluded optimal use of the air tunnels to create downforce, unlike the narrower V12 of the Jaguar.Clarke 1997, p.77 Autocar Jun 10 1987 The newest chassis was assigned to team regulars Bob Wollek and Jochen Mass. Lead drivers Derek Bell and Hans-Joachim Stuck ("BEST"), along with Al Holbert (the team who had won the year before) had a 1-year old chassis after Stuck had wrecked their new car in pre-race testing. The third car, a 1985-chassis that had already done two Le Mans, was given to Vern Schuppan, American Price Cobb and Dutch-Canadian Kees Nierop.Clarke 1997, p.84 Road & Track Nov 1987Clarke 1997, p.88 Motor Sport Jul 1987
Once again, Porsche was well-represented by strong, professional customer teams. With a dozen of the 75x 962s built in the field now, many teams were now making their own modifications to bodyshell, chassis and components. They still had the standard 2.85-litre engines, now capable of 640 bhp.Spurring 2012, pp.276-7 Brun Motorsport, having won the 1986 Teams Championship carried the Number 1, and they had three 962s present. This year team principal Walter Brun stepped aside from driving duties, with his lead car with an all-French line-up led by Pierre de Thoisy. Season regulars Oscar Larrauri and Jésus Pareja, who had finished second last year, had the #2 car, while the third had the all-Canadian crew Bill Adam/Scott Goodyear/Richard Spenard, and was fitted with a TV camera.
With reduced support from the factory, four of the chassis (both Kremers, a Joest and a Brun car) were built in Britain by John Thomson's TC Prototypes, with a lightweight honeycomb composite frame. Both Joest and Kremer built their own engines. Kremer also fitted larger wheel-arches to accommodate their 19" Yokohama tyres. The 2.85-litre engines now put out 640 bhp. Kremer's lead drivers Volker Weidler and Kris Nissen had finished second at Jerez, and were joined by Kunimitsu Takahashi. In contrast, Joest Racing had two new crews for this race: regular team driver Stanley Dickens had veteran Hurley Haywood and Frank Jelinski (who had raced for Brun earlier in the season). Richard Lloyd's Liqui Moly team (now called Britten-Lloyd Racing) had done a lot of innovative work with their new chassis, designed by Nigel Stroud.Wimpffen 2008, p.244 So much so that it was renamed the 962C GTi, fitting adjustable suspension and moveable wings onto a honeycomb-composite chassis. Tyrrell F1 driver Dr Jonathon Palmer was the regular driver for the team and was joined by James Weaver and Pierre Petit. The other Porsche 962 was from the smaller Obermaier Racing team, now co-sponsored by Primagaz. It was the first event for Jürgen Lässig's brand-new 962C, and he was joined by Pierre Yver (who brought the Primagaz money) and Bernard de Dryver.
Jaguar Cars arrived with Tony Southgate's new design: the XJR-8. The engineers at the workshops of Tom Walkinshaw Racing made over 60 modifications. The fuelling and cooling systems were overhauled. Revised aerodynamics gave greater downforce from the new undertray, and to take on the long straights the –LM version had a new nose and low rear wing. The cumulative effect was to make the cars far more reliable. They came in just a kilo over the 850 kg minimum weight. The V12 SOHC engine was increased to 7.0 litres and TWR's engine-specialist, Allan Scott, could tune it up to 720 bhp, giving a top speed of 355 kp/h (220 mph).Spurring 2012, pp.278-9Clarke 1997, p.76 Autocar Jun 10 1987Hodges 1987, p.161 To cope with the increasing downforce, their tyre-supplier Dunlop developed special tyres laced with kevlar to hold their shape under the loads.Wimpffen 2008, p.226 The regular season driver-combinations were Eddie Cheever/Raul Boesel and Jan Lammers/John Watson. The cars were completed in February and the team did extensive winter testing at Paul Ricard. In a dominant display, Jaguar had won all four rounds of the season to date, with the two driving pairs sharing them two apiece. The 1-2 finish at their home race at Silverstone cemented the belief in the minds of British fans that this would be the year of success. For Le Mans, TWR stalwart Win Percy joined the latter pair as a co-driver, while a third car was entered driven for Dane John Nielsen and F1 driver Martin Brundle.
After an indifferent year with the C8, Sauber returned with its new model, the C9. A new monocoque chassis and improved aerodynamics gave it almost twice as much downforce as before. With an improved engine-management system, the Mercedes-Benz M117 engine was now 20 kg lighter and put out 650 bhp, or 800 bhp in qualifying trim.Spurring 2012, pp.282-3Wimpffen 2008, p.227 Combined with a tougher Hewland gearbox, it was a far more competitive package, qualifying second on debut at Silverstone and leading for a time. Once again, they were led by 4-time winner Henri Pescarolo, with Mike Thackwell and Hideki Okada. Thackwell was also cross-entered with the second car, supporting Scottish F1 driver Johnny, Earl Dumfries and American Chip Ganassi. Peter Sauber also sold one of his C8 cars to French privateer Noël del Bello, who had stepped up from running his Tiga in the C2 class.Spurring 2012, p.292
After the debacle at the 1986 race, Nissan returned to Le Mans, its only race this year outside of the Japanese Championship. The new March 87G chassis (designed by Gordon Coppuck) was now fitted with a purpose-built racing Nissan engine. The 3.0-litre DOHC twin-turbo V8 could produce 700 bhp. The chassis was an aluminium honeycomb monocoque with a Kevlar/carbon-fibre bodyshell, the aerodynamic effect was to reduce drag by 20% over the R86V despite a weight-gain.Spurring 2012, pp.284-5 This year, the two cars both had Japanese driving combinations: Hoshino and Matsumoto were together again, with Endurance Champion Kenji Takahashi. The second car had Masahiro Hasemi/Takao Wada/Aguri Suzuki.