1987 German Grand Prix

Championship standings

The World Championship is finely balanced at the midseason: Nelson Piquet leads on 39 points, Ayrton Senna second with 35, Nigel Mansell third with 30 and Alain Prost fourth with 26.

Previous race

At Silverstone, Mansell produced one of the most memorable drives of the season. Starting second, he pitted for fresh tyres on lap 35 and rejoined 29 seconds behind Piquet with 28 laps remaining. He broke the lap record eight times in his charge and passed Piquet at Stowe on lap 63 of 65 to the roar of more than 100,000 home fans. Shortly after the finish his engine failed — he had been running in maximum power mode for the final six laps, risking running out of fuel at any moment. The two Williams cars lapped the entire field on a dry circuit.

Between-race developments

During pre-race testing at Hockenheim, Senna had a very fortunate escape when a tyre failure at over 300 km/h on the long straight leading to the Bremsschikane destroyed the rear corner of his Lotus 99T — parts were scattered into the surrounding forest. As a result of the crash Goodyear immediately flew in new compound tyres from their plant in Akron, Ohio for the Grand Prix weekend. The failure was traced to a puncture Senna had picked up on his previous lap; the active suspension had compensated for the deflation and kept the car at its correct ride height, masking the problem from the driver. The incident has prompted questions about whether active suspension could conceal tyre problems that a conventional car would make apparent through its handling.