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 on to the circuit during Friday practice. Johansson was fortunate to escape with little more than a headache. Piquet had collided with Pascal Fabre ending with the Williams impacting in the wall. The first race start ended quickly after the Zakspeed 871 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 JS29C. 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 A10) and Riccardo Patrese (Brabham BT56) collided and half the grid, including Johansson, Alex Caffi (Osella FA1H), Ivan Capelli (March 871), Pascal Fabre (AGS JH22), Philippe Alliot (Lola LC87), and both Zakspeeds of Brundle and Christian Danner were involved in the ensuing pile-up.
For the third start Streiff was missing. Tyrrell had run out of usable cars and Palmer got the use of the surviving Tyrrell DG016. Several drivers were in repaired cars or in spare cars, including Ayrton Senna after a CV joint failed in his Lotus 99T during the second start. The third start, over two hours late, continued to claim cars. Alain Prost had an electrical failure as the warm-up lap began. McLaren mechanics got the car going and Prost started from pitlane along with Senna and the Ferrari F1/87 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 problem and Mansell leapt past Piquet during pitstops. Fabi was a lap down in third ahead of Boutsen in a season best result for Benetton. 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.
Read more about this topic: 1987 Austrian Grand Prix
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