1987 Champion Spark Plug 400

1987 Champion Spark Plug 400

Race details
Race 19 of 29 in the 1987 NASCAR Winston Cup Series
The 1987 Champion Spark Plug 400 program cover.
Date	August 16, 1987
Official name	18th Annual Champion Spark Plug 400
Location	Brooklyn, Michigan, Michigan International Speedway
Course	Permanent racing facility 2 mi (3.2 km)
Distance	200 laps, 400 mi (643.737 km)
Scheduled Distance	200 laps, 400 mi (643.737 km)
Average speed	138.648 miles per hour (223.132 km/h)
Attendance	72,000
Pole position
Driver	Davey Allison	Ranier-Lundy Racing
Time	42.178
Most laps led
Driver	Dale Earnhardt	Blue Max Racing
Laps	63
Winner
No. 9	Bill Elliott	Melling Racing
Television in the United States
Network	ESPN
Announcers	Bob Jenkins, Larry Nuber
Radio in the United States
Radio	Motor Racing Network

The 1987 Champion Spark Plug 400 was the 19th stock car race of the 1987 NASCAR Winston Cup Series season and the 18th iteration of the event. The race was held on Sunday, August 16, 1987, before an audience of 72,000 in Brooklyn, Michigan, at Michigan International Speedway, a two-mile (3.2 km) moderate-banked D-shaped speedway. The race took the scheduled 200 laps to complete.

In the final laps of the race, Melling Racing's Bill Elliott was able to hold off a late-race charges by Richard Petty and Dale Earnhardt, holding off the field on the final restart with eight laps left to take his 20th career NASCAR Winston Cup Series victory and his third victory of the season.^[1][2] To fill out the top three, the aforementioned Dale Earnhardt and King Racing's Morgan Shepherd finished second and third, respectively.

The race was held at Michigan International Speedway, a two-mile (3.2 km) moderate-banked D-shaped speedway located in Brooklyn, Michigan. The track is used primarily for NASCAR events. It is known as a "sister track" to Texas World Speedway as MIS's oval design was a direct basis of TWS, with moderate modifications to the banking in the corners, and was used as the basis of Auto Club Speedway. The track is owned by International Speedway Corporation. Michigan International Speedway is recognized as one of motorsports' premier facilities because of its wide racing surface and high banking (by open-wheel standards; the 18-degree banking is modest by stock car standards).

• (R) denotes rookie driver.

Qualifying was split into two rounds. The first round was held on Saturday, August 15, at 11:30 AM EST. Each driver had one lap to set a time. During the first round, the top 20 drivers in the round were guaranteed a starting spot in the race. If a driver was not able to guarantee a spot in the first round, they had the option to scrub their time from the first round and try and run a faster lap time in a second round qualifying run, held on Saturday, at 2:00 PM EST. As with the first round, each driver had one lap to set a time. For this specific race, positions 21-40 were decided on time,^[3] and depending on who needed it, a select amount of positions were given to cars who had not otherwise qualified but were high enough in owner's points; up to two provisionals were given.

Davey Allison, driving for Ranier-Lundy Racing, managed to win the pole, setting a time of 42.178 and an average speed of 170.705 miles per hour (274.723 km/h) in the first round.^[4]

Ten drivers failed to qualify. Two drivers who failed to qualify, Jocko Maggiacomo and Donny Paul, were both involved in qualifying crashes.^[5]

Drivers' Championship standings Pos Driver Points 1 Dale Earnhardt 3,151 1 2 Bill Elliott 2,653 (-498) 1 3 Terry Labonte 2,552 (-599) 1 4 Neil Bonnett 2,507 (–644) 2 5 Rusty Wallace 2,480 (–671) 6 Darrell Waltrip 2,479 (–672) 3 7 Kyle Petty 2,463 (–688) 8 Ricky Rudd 2,402 (–749) 9 Ken Schrader 2,341 (–810) 10 Richard Petty 2,323 (–828) Official driver's standings Note: Only the first 10 positions are included for the driver standings.