The Real NASCAR Driver Who Inspired Tom Cruise’s Cole Trickle in ‘Days of Thunder’

Tom Cruise is officially climbing back into the world of NASCAR.

With a “Days of Thunder” sequel now scheduled to arrive in theaters on June 2, 2028, Cruise will reprise his role as Cole Trickle nearly four decades after the original movie introduced audiences to the talented, fearless and occasionally reckless young driver.

But Cole Trickle wasn’t created entirely in a Hollywood writers’ room.

Long before Cruise’s fictional driver climbed into the No. 46 City Chevrolet, NASCAR had its own version of the charismatic outsider who arrived with enormous talent, little understanding of stock cars and an ability to attract attention everywhere he went.

His name was Tim Richmond.

And while “Days of Thunder” borrowed stories and personalities from throughout the NASCAR garage, Richmond provided much of the real-life foundation for Cruise’s character.

Tim Richmond Was the Real-Life Inspiration Behind Cole Trickle

Richmond didn’t arrive in NASCAR through the traditional stock-car pipeline.

An Ohio native with an open-wheel background, Richmond competed in the 1980 Indianapolis 500 before eventually turning his attention to NASCAR. He was talented, flamboyant and dramatically different from many of the drivers who populated the Cup garage during that era.

That outsider quality became an important piece of Cole Trickle.

ESPN’s extensive oral history of “Days of Thunder” identified Richmond as the driver upon whom Trickle was loosely based, and Darrell Waltrip offered perhaps the clearest explanation of how Richmond made his way onto the screen.

“The whole thing about the driver not really knowing anything about cars, just going out there and driving, that was exactly Tim Richmond,” Waltrip said.

Even one of the movie’s most memorable sequences came directly from Richmond’s career.

In the film, crew chief Harry Hogge tries to teach Cole that raw speed isn’t enough. Cole runs a tire test his way before doing it Harry’s way, learning that managing the equipment can ultimately make him faster.

According to Waltrip, that wasn’t invented for the movie.

“The tire test where Harry teaches Cole Trickle how to go faster by saving his tires, that was Harry Hyde and Tim at a real tire test at North Wilkesboro,” he said.

And that leads to another major real-world connection.

Harry Hogge Was Inspired by Tim Richmond’s Actual Crew Chief

Richmond wasn’t the only member of his Hendrick Motorsports team who found a second life in “Days of Thunder.”

Robert Duvall’s Harry Hogge was inspired by legendary NASCAR crew chief Harry Hyde, a connection NASCAR itself recognizes in Hyde’s Hall of Fame biography.

Hyde and Richmond were paired together at Hendrick Motorsports, and the relationship was almost tailor-made for Hollywood.

Hyde was an old-school mechanic and championship-winning crew chief. Richmond was the unconventional driver with enormous natural ability who initially knew relatively little about the machinery underneath him.

Eventually, they figured each other out.

The pairing produced seven victories during Richmond’s remarkable 1986 season, when he finished third in the Cup standings.

That driver-crew chief dynamic became part of the DNA of Cole and Harry.

But “Days of Thunder” wasn’t a biography of Richmond, and that’s an important distinction. The filmmakers filled the movie with stories collected from around the NASCAR garage.

Geoff Bodine recalled that Harry’s explosive “I can’t work with this” confrontation with Cole was rooted in Hyde’s own frustration with Bodine. Dr. Jerry Punch said the famous scene in which Harry tells Cole to hit the pace car traced back to Hyde and Buddy Baker. Even the gag in which Harry refuses to let Cole pit because the crew is eating ice cream came from something Hyde did to Benny Parsons.

Cole Trickle was built around Richmond, but his world was assembled from decades of NASCAR lore.

So Where Did the Name Cole Trickle Come From?

This is where the story gets even more interesting.

Despite Tim Richmond providing the primary inspiration for Cole’s personality and racing story, another real driver is associated with the character’s unmistakable last name: Dick Trickle.

Trickle was a Wisconsin short-track legend who reportedly won more than 1,000 races before and during a NASCAR career that ultimately included more than 300 Cup Series starts.

The similarity wasn’t lost on Trickle himself.

Years later, ESPN’s Ryan McGee recalled asking him whether Cole Trickle was his son after music from “Days of Thunder” began playing at Darlington.

“Hell, I don’t know, kid,” Trickle joked. “Could be. Some of those nights back there, they’re a little fuzzy.”

So the cleanest way to understand Cruise’s character is this:

Tim Richmond provided the central real-life inspiration for Cole Trickle. Dick Trickle is associated with the name. And the character’s experiences were filled out with stories from numerous real NASCAR drivers, crew chiefs and teams.

That distinction matters because “Days of Thunder” was never really trying to tell one driver’s biography.

It was turning the NASCAR garage itself into a movie.

Tim Richmond’s NASCAR Career Was Brilliant and Tragically Short

Richmond’s story ultimately went somewhere far darker than Cole Trickle’s.

After his spectacular seven-win 1986 season, Richmond missed the beginning of 1987 while battling what was publicly described at the time as pneumonia.

He returned that summer and immediately reminded everyone what he could do, winning at Pocono and Riverside.

But his health deteriorated, and Richmond’s racing career ended far too soon. He died on Aug. 13, 1989, from complications of AIDS. He was 34.

That was before audiences ever saw Cruise as Cole Trickle.

In an extraordinary collision between NASCAR history and Hollywood, Richmond died the same day Cruise and screenwriter Robert Towne were at Watkins Glen conducting research for the movie.

Days of Thunder reached theaters the following summer. Richmond never got to see the finished film. But pieces of him were there.

The open-wheel outsider. The extraordinary natural ability. The driver learning the nuances of stock cars. The combustible relationship with an old-school crew chief. The speed, swagger and unpredictability.

More than 35 years later, Cruise is preparing to become Cole Trickle again.

And as NASCAR fans wait to find out what Cole’s life looks like nearly four decades later, it’s worth remembering that one of the most recognizable fictional racers in movie history began with a very real NASCAR driver.

His name was Tim Richmond.