After the Canadian Grand Prix Minardi decided that it had had enough with Adrián Campos and replaced the Spaniard with Pierluigi Martini. The Detroit circuit had been partially resurfaced and it was not long before the surface began to deteriorate. Ayrton Senna took his sixth consecutive pole position but Alain Prost was not alongside him on this occasion, Gerhard Berger putting his Ferrari second. Michele Alboreto was third in the second Ferrari and then came Prost. Thierry Boutsen (Benetton-Ford) was fifth with Nigel Mansell (Williams) sixth ahead of Sandro Nannini (Benetton) and Nelson Piquet in the Lotus-Honda. The top 10 was rounded off by Derek Warwick (Arrows-Megatron) and Riccardo Patrese in the second Williams.

Ivan Capelli had a nasty accident on Saturday when he hit the pitwall and broke a bone in his foot, while four people on the pitwall suffered cuts and bruises.

At the start of the race Senna went into the lead while Prost made a poor start and dropped behind Boutsen. It took Prost until lap six to get up to second place but then he stayed there for the rest of the race to finish three-quarters of a minute behind Senna. Berger went out with a puncture while Alboreto was punted out by Nannini, rejoined and then went out later in another accident. Piquet also hit a wall. All this meant that Boutsen finished third with Andrea de Cesaris fourth in the Rial, Jonathan Palmer fifth for Tyrrell and Martini scoring the first point for Minardi.