After his rookie of the year performance at Indy in May 1980, Tim Richmond struggled in IndyCar. He crashed in practice at Milwaukee, on the first lap at Mid-Ohio, and had a major crash at Michigan on lap 5. His mother was adamant he leave IndyCar and Tim was discouraged as well. This was Tim's second to last IndyCar race but returned for the 1981 Indy 500.

From the ESPN 30 for 30 on Tim

Richmond left IndyCar after the Michigan crash. "It's not really the owner's idea. I brought it up yesterday after the race," Richmond said. "I told them to do whatever was best for me and the team and if they thought it would help if I got out of the car, I would. I really don't know why I've been crashing. We've been pushing all weekend at Michigan and then in the race, the thing just snaps around and wham, we're in the fence again."

"I think he's gonna be a great race driver some day if he lives to tell about it," crew-chief John Barnes said. "But right now he's over his head. Tim is a pilot - not a race driver. He's driving an Indy car like a sprinter, stabbing it and steering it and you can't do that with these things. It takes all of his concentration just to steer the car. He can't look at the gauges or tell me what the car is doing because he just doesn't have any experience. He's not driving with any ease and he can't relax because he white-knuckles the thing all the time... He's got that determination to be a winner, just like Danny Ongais had. But right now he's gun-shy. He doesn't know what's happening. He was a champ one day and a chump the other and that's hard to take when you're only 25 years old."

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