Family Ties : Off-Road Racing Veteran Bob Gordon Will Compete Against His 17-Year-Old Son, Rob, This Afternoon at Riverside Raceway

When 17-year-old Rob Gordon asks his father, Bob, for the keys to the car, it usually means it’s time for a pit crew to go to work.

The Gordons are off-road racers and will be among the field today in the SCORE Off-Road Championships at Riverside International Raceway.

Bob, who owns a feed company in Los Alamitos that supplies the horse racing tracks in Southern California, has three race cars. He will drive in the unlimited single-seat, unlimited two-seat and 1650cc classes.

Rob, a 17-year-old senior at El Modena High School, will race in the 1650cc class.

It will mark the third time the two have competed against each other in a race.

Rob was credited with the fastest lap time at the Parker 400, but he hit a rock on the second loop, suffered two flat tires and a broken front suspension, and limped home for 10th place. Bob, showing the skill and expertise that comes with years of racing, kept a steady pace to finish second.

The two met again at the Lucerne 250, where Rob finished second but was penalized 15 minutes for failing to stop at a crossing. Bob, despite an early problem with a flat tire, finished fourth.

“Rob has made some mistakes that come with youth,” his father said. “He has no fear at all. He’s driving as fast as anybody in the sport. But he’s also got some things to learn.”

Still, Bob said he was surprised to find that his son was five minutes ahead of him in his off-road racing debut at the Parker 400.

“I came into the pit area for fuel after the first loop and asked if anybody had seen Rob,” Bob said. “The crew told me, ‘Don’t worry about Rob. He was here five minutes ago.’

“He probably would have won the race, but he got impatient. He got behind a vehicle and instead of honking or bumping the slower car out of the way he decided to go outside the course to go around the guy.

“He went out into the weeds and hit a big rock. You never know what’s going to be out there off the course, and Rob found out the hard way.”

Rob Gordon was been racing for five years. He finished fourth in the World Mini Grand Prix motocross championships in Las Vegas and earned a professional motocross contract for Kawasaki’s Team Green. He won the 125cc motorcycle class at Riverside last year despite crashing in his heat race.

“I had passed all the 250s and was halfway through the 500 field when I crashed,” Rob said. “I started showing off, but I came back to win the main event.”

The victory surprised his father.

“Rob was laying in the motor home complaining about how bad he hurt,” Gordon said. “I figured he was done for the day. The next thing I know, he’s out there on the race track and wins the main event.”

That meant there were two winners that day for the Gordon family. Bob won the Class 10 race and finished second in the Class 1 feature. Gordon is featured on this year’s race program for his Class 10 victory.

Despite his success on the race track at Riverside, Bob Gordon is probably best known for an incident that happened off the track five years ago.

Gordon was staying at a nearby hotel and returned to check out following the event. He parked his truck and tractor rig containing his dune buggy outside the hotel. When he returned an hour later, the unit was gone.

Gordon, who did not have his car and trailer insured, dropped out of racing for six months. When he returned, his son began to pre-run the desert races with his father.

Rob began riding motorcycles when he was 5. He envisioned a career as a professional motocross rider, but his father had other ideas.

“I watched kids break their necks in three straight races in the Golden State series that Rob was competing in and said, ‘That’s it,’ ” Bob said. “I prefer seeing a roll cage around him.

“He got knocked cuckoo here last year. When he broke his arm twice in the period of a month, that was enough. The second time he broke his arm, the rear suspension broke on a double jump and he shot 30 feet into the air.

“Nobody wants to see their kid get hurt. He had a lot of ability in motocross. But it seemed like when Saddleback Park closed, he was no longer as sharp in the races and was starting to get hurt.”

Now, the only hurt for Bob Gordon is watching his son finish five minutes ahead of him at a checkpoint.