1987 British Grand Prix

Qualifying report

As usual, Honda-powered cars dominated the qualifying sessions, with Nelson Piquet taking pole position and Ayrton Senna third in his Lotus despite being a full second slower than Mansell. Alain Prost was fourth in his McLaren, while the Benettons of Thierry Boutsen and Teo Fabi were fifth and sixth, and the Ferraris of Michele Alboreto and Gerhard Berger seventh and eighth. Completing the top ten were Andrea de Cesaris in the Brabham and Stefan Johansson in the second McLaren.

During qualifying, Piercarlo Ghinzani's Ligier ran out of fuel in front of the pits. His mechanics jumped the pit wall, refuelled him on the track and then push-started him, a clear violation of the rules leading to Ghinzani's exclusion from the remainder of the event. Before the incident, the Italian had set a time which would have put him 19th on the grid.

Qualifying classification

Race report

At the start, Prost was the quickest and took the lead, only to be passed by Piquet at Maggotts; Mansell soon followed his teammate. The race then developed into a battle between the two Williams drivers, with Piquet leading.

On lap 35, Mansell was around two seconds behind his teammate. Both Williams drivers were scheduled to complete the race without a tyre change, but Mansell and the team elected to make a stop to change tyres. Mansell rejoined the race some 29 seconds behind Piquet, with 28 laps remaining. On fresh rubber, Mansell began an epic charge, breaking the lap record eight times to the delight of the over 100,000 strong British crowd.

By lap 62 Mansell was right on Piquet's tail, and on lap 63 the Englishman overtook his teammate. Shortly after crossing the finish line, Mansell's car slowed down and was engulfed by the crowd. Initially it was thought that he had run out of fuel, but he had actually blown up the engine, out of the stress of running the last 6 laps on "Q" mode (which gives the engine +100 hp), and risking running out of fuel at any moment (his fuel display was reading "minus 2.5 laps"). In fact that incident was the last straw for the patience of the Honda management, since it had – again – threatened their easily attainable 1-2 result. Honda would switch their supply of engines from Williams to McLaren for 1988, while Piquet would sign for Lotus – also running Hondas – in the following weeks. Senna finished third, one lap down, with a further lap back to teammate Satoru Nakajima in fourth. Derek Warwick was fifth in the Arrows-Megatron, with Fabi completing the top six.

Race classification

Numbers in brackets refer to positions of normally aspirated entrants competing for the Jim Clark Trophy.

• • Piercarlo Ghinzani was excluded from the race due to refuelling his car on the track during qualifying.

Championship standings after the race

;Drivers' Championship standings

;Constructors' Championship standings

;Jim Clark Trophy standings

;Colin Chapman Trophy standings

• Note: Only the top five positions are included for all four sets of standings.

References

| Previous_year's_race = 1986 British Grand Prix | Next_year's_race = 1988 British Grand Prix

References

1. (26 April 2001). "Honda engines report". [[Honda]].
2. "1987 British Grand Prix". formula1.com.
3. "Britain 1987 - Championship • STATS F1".