Indy 200, Fisher came tenth, her second and final top-ten finish of 2001. During practice for the SunTrust Indy Challenge at Richmond International Raceway two weeks later, she crashed heavily in turn two and was hospitalized with neck pains. Later that day, IRL's director of medical services Henry Bock declared Fisher fit to race, and she finished in 17th place after qualifying a season-high second. She finished no better than 11th in the final six races, and was 19th in the drivers' standings with 188 points. Fans voted Fisher the IRL's Most Popular Driver of 2001. On April 8, 2002, Fisher requested a release from her contract with Walker Racing after it switched to the rival Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART) full-time, and problems with finding sponsorship from her performance in the latter half of 2001 made a full IRL campaign was unfeasible. Walker wanted to enter Fisher into the Toyota Atlantic Series as preparation for CART, which she did not want to do because of her belief of the prestige of the Indianapolis 500 and wanted to help the IRL become the United States' premier open-wheel racing series. Her season began at the fund-raising Toyota Pro/Celebrity Race, where she finished third in the pro class and fifth overall. Her race engineer was Mark Weida. Two days later, Dreyer & Reinbold Racing hired Fisher to drive its 24 G-Force GF05C Infiniti car in place of the injured Robbie Buhl in the season's fourth round, the Firestone Indy 225, where she finished a year-best fourth. Fisher was later signed to race in the Indianapolis 500 in May in Dreyer and Reinbold's No. 23 car. She recorded a four-lap average qualifying speed all-time record for a woman in Indianapolis 500 history at for ninth, then finished the race 24th. A month later, Fisher signed to drive the rest of the season with Dreyer and Reinbold. After leading four laps for eighth at the Michigan Indy 400, Fisher set a Kentucky Speedway track record at to earn the pole position for the Belterra Casino Indy 300, the first time a woman had claimed a pole in American open-wheel racing. In 10 races, she scored 161 points for 18th in the championship standings. Fisher was voted by fans as IRL's Most Popular Driver for the second successive year. In September 2002, Fisher drove a MP4-17 car in a demonstration run at Indianapolis Motor Speedway's