The museum piece

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – When you travel to this city, even for the purpose of attending an NHRA drag race, you do so knowing you are in the heart of NASCAR country.

          Your loyal blogger spent part of the day at the drag strip and then went looking for the compound where Hendrick Motorsports houses its garages, administrative offices and museum. The general public is allowed to enter the shops where cars are prepared for Jeff Gordon, Jimmie Johnson, Dale Earnhardt Jr. and Kasey Kahne, I am told.

          I went to the museum, intending to buy a shirt for Mrs. Leeway. The shirt was eventually purchased but not until after yours truly was slapped with a racing memory after walking in the door.

          The second car on the left after entering the museum is a deep red stock car,

Tim Richmond's final winner.

once sponsored by Folgers Coffee. The car was number 25 and I knew immediately what I was looking at. In order to be sure, I walked to the right side of the car to look for the dry brake, which is what you call the fuel filler apparatus for a stock car.

          Yep, there it was. Suspicion confirmed. A road racer.

          This was the car Tim Richmond drove at Riverside International Raceway when he earned his final racing victory on Father’s Day, 1987. I covered that race.

          Tim Richmond! Now there was a talent, proof that sometimes charisma and ability can come together and create a special opportunity.

          Richmond drove for the Hendrick organization (which is how the car ended up in the Hendrick museum, right?) and brought some added excitement to racing. He was talented in the car, funny during an interview and, apparently, he was very appealing to women.

          That last victory, on the twisting Southern California road course, came after Richmond had been seriously ill for a time. There were all kinds of rumors about the source of his illness. To be honest, I don’t enjoy talking about some of the things that were said.

          What I remember is that there was a hamburger stand-type food spot in the infield at Riverside and you could sometimes find drivers there grabbing a burger or a soda. Things were much more relaxed then than they are now in terms of driver availability.

          Richmond was drinking a soda, sitting by himself at a picnic table in the small

This car is also in the museum, the remains of a terrible
wreck from which driver Ken Schrader walked away.

shaded area next to the window where you bought the food. I asked him if he minded my sitting there, which he did not, and I asked him a few questions.

          I don’t recall now if this was in 1987 or earlier, but what I do recall is that Richmond was very friendly and he answered my questions comfortably. Finished with the interview, I bought something to eat and returned to the table and Richmond was still there, still by himself. So I sat again and we chatted briefly before he had to get back to his car before the next practice started.

          Whatever people say now about Richmond’s exceptionally active social lifestyle, I still remember the guy who chatted easily with a reporter from small-town newspaper in the heat of the day at Riverside.

 

           Tim Richmond died of AIDS in 1989.