1989 United States Grand Prix

In October 1988, officials in the city of Detroit, Michigan, refused to invest more money to bring the Detroit street circuit up to new Formula 1 regulations, and an attempt to move the circuit to a new circuit on Belle Isle , an island in the Detroit River, failed (although there was success for IndyCar's move to Belle Isle for 1992). This resulted in the cancellation of the Detroit Grand Prix for the 1989 season. City officials in Phoenix, Arizona, were interested in hosting a major sporting e...

Those to miss out included Piercarlo Ghinzani , who was fifth in his Osella , and sixth-fastest Pierre-Henri Raphanel in the Coloni . Seventh was Gregor Foitek in the EuroBrun , ahead of the second Osella of Nicola Larini . In a better showing than in previous races, Joachim Winkelhock was ninth in his AGS , followed by Volker Weidler in the Rial . Then came the two Zakspeeds of Bernd Schneider and Aguri Suzuki , with Bertrand Gachot slowest in the other Onyx, after a CV joint failed on his car,...

Senna's Friday time of 1:30.710 stood up through the second session and gave him his 34th career pole position, breaking Jim Clark 's record of 33 which he had equalled in the previous race in Mexico .

During the morning practice on Saturday, Prost spun backward into a wall and damaged the monocoque and gearbox. It was the first monocoque Prost had broken since joining the team in 1984 . Prost then had to take Senna's spare car for the race.

The only American driver in the field, Phoenix native Eddie Cheever , qualified his Arrows - Ford in 17th place, some 3.1 seconds slower than pole man Senna.

Alessandro Nannini crashed his Benetton heavily in the morning warm-up session and was forced to start the race not only in the spare car but also wearing a neck brace due to a very sore neck. [ 5 ]

Prost got a jump on Senna at the start, but hit a bump in the straight, causing his wheels to spin and the engine to be cut momentarily by the rev limiter allowing Senna to pull ahead, but by the end of the first lap his lead was only 0.45 seconds. Nannini ran third followed by Nigel Mansell , Alex Caffi , Stefano Modena , Martin Brundle , Gerhard Berger , Andrea de Cesaris and Michele Alboreto .

Nannini's neck could only take 10 laps of racing before he pulled into the pits to retire. He had been third until a spin on lap four dropped him to eighth and retired after not being able to hold his head up properly and complaining of dizziness. After 16 laps, Senna's lead over Prost was 4.25 seconds. He suddenly doubled that on the next lap when Prost's engine began overheating, forcing the Frenchman to back off for a few laps in a bid to get the water and oil temperatures back to normal. Des...

The gap between the two McLarens varied as they worked their way through traffic, but on lap 29, Prost closed the gap when Senna suffered a misfire. The problem disappeared momentarily, with Senna doing his fastest lap of the race, but then returned, worse than before. Nigel Mansell would soon retire for the 4th time out of 5 races by lap 32 with the result of an alternator failure. On lap 34, with Prost only one second back, Senna waved his teammate past as they went down the back straight and ...

The Honda engine's electronic fuel injection system was acting up and after two pit stops to change the black box, battery and plugs, and with successive fastest laps in between, Senna retired on lap 44 with electrical problems (notably his 1st retirement of the season). Since joining McLaren at the start of 1988 it was his first ever retirement because of a Honda engine failure and the first failure of their V10 engine under race conditions. It was also only the second time in 21 races with McL...

As was predicted, the two-hour time limit was reached after 75 of the scheduled 81 laps, and Prost coasted to his only United States win (after not having won at Watkins Glen , Long Beach , Las Vegas , Detroit or Dallas ), and increased his then all-time record victory total to 36 and his first win in a naturally aspirated car (his only other season in F1 without turbo power had been his rookie season with McLaren in 1980 when the team used the Cosworth DFV V8 engine ). He also took the lead, by...

33°26′52.5″N 112°4′28.5″W  /  33.447917°N 112.074583°W  / 33.447917; -112.074583