For Giancarlo Minardi’s small team, 1987 marked their third season in Formula 1. Despite the many struggles of previous years, managing just five race finishes against a staggering forty retirements, the team from Faenza returned to the grid with renewed determination, aided by a small financial contribution from new Spanish driver Adrián Campos.
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| MINARDI M187, Adrian Campos Spa-Francorchamps, Belgian GP 1987 |
Unfortunately, that financial backing was the only valuable asset Campos brought with him, as he proved to be a very poor driver. He displayed amateurish behavior such as being disqualified at the season-opening race in Brazil, where he exited the car just before the warm-up lap, only to rejoin the pack by weaving through the grid to reclaim his 16th place. At Monaco, he crashed during the formation lap.
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| MINARDI M187, Alessandro Nannini Montecarlo, Monaco GP 1987 |
Luckily, the team's first-choice driver was again the talented Italian Alessandro Nannini, who managed to show good driving skills despite frequently being forced to retire due to mechanical issues. Once again, the limited budget did not allow engineer Giacomo Caliri to design an entirely new car, so the Minardi M187 was simply an evolution of the previous season’s vehicle. To be fair, the M186 had been a completely new design introduced late in the 1986 season and had only appeared in the final races of that year’s championship.
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| MINARDI M187, Alessandro Nannini Silverstone, British GP 1987 |
Thus, no additional funds were invested in the 1987 car, and the M187 chassis received only minor updates. It retained the same carbon-fiber monocoque, originally designed in 1984, and continued to use the V6 turbo 619/90 engine from Motori Moderni, paired with a six-speed gearbox built in-house by the Faenza team. The car weighed 540 kg and had a 2690 mm wheelbase, with double wishbone suspension using a pullrod layout at both the front and rear.
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| MINARDI M187, Adrian Campos Hungaroring, Hungarian GP 1987 |
Like its predecessor, the M187 was far from competitive, and the 1987 season ended up being another string of retirements caused by mechanical failures. Only on four occasions, three with Nannini and one with Campos, did the drivers make it to the finish line. The best results were two eleventh-place finishes by Nannini, achieved in Hungary and Portugal.
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