Remembering Nascar Driver Tim Richmond

Remembering Nascar Driver Tim Richmond

Almost twenty-two years ago, Tim Richmond died. He was 34. Race fans remember Richmond, but even if you don’t, you know him if you’ve seen “Days of Thunder.”
Richmond unfortunately contacted AIDS and took a leave of absence from racing, but would eventually return to the track in 1987. In his first race back, at Pocono, he won. He’d win again the next week in California. But that would be the last time Tim Richmond ever went to victory lane. His Cup career ended with a blown engine at Michigan International Speedway on Aug. 16, 1987.
Subsequently banned from racing by NASCAR because of alleged drug use, Richmond went to Florida to live out what would be his final days. On the morning of Aug. 13, 1989, he called his mother to ask her to come to his hospital room in West Palm Beach, Fla. Before she got there, Richmond died, alone in his room.