Home :

Die-Hard Racers

McMillin Upholds Legacy Of Family In Baja 1000

He and Gordon claim overall four-wheel title

As Andy McMillin drove his Chevy pickup into La Paz, Mexico, shortly after dawn yesterday, his thoughts drifted back to his childhood. “I've been coming to the Baja 1000 since I was a baby,” said the 19-year-old off-road racer. This race is a lot of my family's history. I would rather win the Baja 1000 than all the other races combined.”

And yesterday, the third-generation driver did. McMillin teamed with Robby Gordon to win the overall four-wheel title of the record-setting 39th annual Tecate SCORE Baja 1000. Gordon and McMillin covered the 1,047.8-mile course in 19 hours, 15 minutes, 27 seconds – a time bettered only by the winning motorcycle team. Steve Hengeveld of Oak Hills led Honda to its 10th consecutive overall motorcycle title, teaming with Mike Childress and Quinn Cody to finish in 18:17:50 for an average speed of 57.27 mph. The win was the fifth straight for Hengeveld.

Gordon drove the first 702 miles of the race, then turned the Chevy CK 1500 TrophyTruck over to McMillin. Gordon then caught a private jet to Homestead, Fla., for tomorrow's final race of the cup Nextel Cup Series. McMillin drove the final 345 miles, completing the course nearly 41 minutes faster than the open-class buggy co-driven by Troy Herbst and Larry Roeseler. “We didn't have a problem all race,” said McMillin, who was in the lead when he climbed into the truck and padded the margin over a particularly rough section of the course.

McMillin's first overall victory in the Baja 1000 was the family's sixth. Uncle Mark McMillin is a five-time overall winner. And the class victory was the 13th for the racing family, whose patriarch, Corky McMillin, died 14 months ago after falling ill in a SCORE race. Andy and father Scott will campaign a TrophyTruck as a team next season.

McMillin's win capped a strong day for San Diego County drivers and riders. San Diego drivers captured six of the top 15 overall positions in the four-wheel division. Ramona's Darren Hardesty and Mark Randazzo finished ninth overall and won the Class 10 (1650cc) title. The team led by Ramona's Danny Prather and Mike Cafro of Chula Vista won the overall ATV title. And two San Diego-based teams won class titles in the motorcycle division. Ron Wilson and Tim Morton of Encinitas led a team to a fifth overall in the motorcycle division and a first in the riders-over-30 class. The Chula Vista-based team of Tom Grisham, Carl Fischer, Mike Mitchell and Mark Chicado finished seventh overall and won the 250cc class.

Gordon started 31st among the 36 TrophyTrucks and quickly made his way through the field despite racing in near-zero visibility because of the dusty conditions.

Sometimes we couldn't see past the hood. We relied on GPS. (Navigator) Andy Grider did a great job. We'd come up on a pack of three and four trucks at a time stuck behind an ATV and drive through.

Gordon had taken the time lead after 400 miles and was running ahead of the entire field by the 600-mile mark. “When I got the truck, it was in great shape and in the lead,” McMillin said. “And I had the opportunity to pad the lead going into a treacherous section of the course that I had prerun twice. I was fresh and I did my thing. But the last couple of miles, my thoughts were really about my grandfather. It felt great standing there in the winner's circle.”

cup And Baja

Adventure's his game ... Robby Gordon's his name. He'll triple-dip this week.

Robby Gordon both owns and drives for his Nextel Cup team for one simple reason: He's such a head case that he couldn't work for anybody else. Don't you love him? Ernest Hemingway would have. Many have mixed emotions about the talented but high-strung Gordon. The same ego and passion that force him to feud with his fellow Cup drivers also have him off chasing bulls and running his own cup team. Gordon is not faint-hearted.

While cup debates the issue of Nextel Cup drivers competing at the Busch level -- the argument heated up after Tony Stewart's crash in last Saturday's Busch event, leading to more health concerns the next day during the Cup race -- double-dipping doesn't seem to faze Gordon.

In fact, he's triple-dipping this week. Gordon is driving in three different cars in two countries, spending more time in planes than in ground vehicles to make it possible. And Gordon won't drive anything as wimpy as a Champ or IRL car. Robby plans to defend his title in the Baja 500, a cross-country race in the Mexican desert. Compared with American oval- or road-race events, the Baja 500 is not exactly a leisurely Sunday drive.

Gordon will travel 11,200 miles by air -- nearly halfway around the world -- to pull off his Dover-Baja triple. After Charlotte and its 600-mile journey on Sunday, Gordon flew to Ensenada, Mexico, so that he could practice for three days with his Chevrolet 1500 Trophy Truck and Hummer 3. On Thursday evening Gordon will fly to Dover, Del., a trip that charts at 2,800 miles. There Robby will practice and qualify his No. 7 Chevy for the Sunday Cup event.

Then he'll fly back to Mexico. On Saturday morning he'll start the Baja 500 in the Trophy Truck. Robby's father, Bob, will start the race in the H3. Approximately halfway through the 424-mile course, Robby will switch cars, replacing his dad behind the wheel of the Hummer to finish the race. (Andy McMillin will step into the Trophy Truck. McMillin campaigns the Team Gordon truck full-time in the SCORE International Off-Road Series.)

When the seven-hour race ends in Mexico, Gordon will reboard his plane and fly overnight to Dover, where he will compete in the Cup race on Sunday. The schedule is the same as a year ago when Gordon won the Baja 500, except this time he'll drive two cars instead of one.

Gordon is used to such stunts, having pulled off the popular Indy-Charlotte double three times on Memorial Day weekends. For Gordon, logistics are as simple as Legos when it comes to putting the pieces together. And Gordon plans on running more Indy-Charlotte doubles in the future. The starting time of the Indy 500 was pushed back last Sunday, making it impossible to do both. But the state of Indiana has changed its stance on Daylight Savings Time. Gordon believes the net result is a wash.

It's still possible for someone to do both, and I may try it again next year. I've come close to winning the Indy 500 before, and it's still a goal of mine at some point in my career. But I'm not interested in 'doing the double' just for the sake of doing it. I want to be competitive in both races, with a chance to win.

Why does Gordon do it? Well, sponsors such as Red Bull, Jim Beam and Toyo Tires love the exposure that such adventure brings. Basically, Robby makes drivers money to be crazy. Plus, Gordon is a man's man. He'd have a hard time having someone else tell him what to do. He's a throwback to drivers like A.J. Foyt, to whom Robby often is compared. Not coincidentally, Gordon drove an Indy car for Foyt in 1993, the year after A.J.'s last 500 at Indy.

Gordon comes from old stock, the pioneers who would drive their cars to the track, then crank the wrenches before the race. Then they'd will their way to a fifth-place finish even after an early wreck. They'd finish fifth because they needed the money to get back home.

Gordon grew up off-road racing and looks forward to running the Baja. But he also looks forward to stock cars, formula cars, road racers and Daytona, Indy, Dakar (he was in the Dakar Rally in January), Long Beach, etc. Gordon said of his Baja adventures,

This is the sort of thing I live for. Obviously, Nextel Cup is our primary focus, but when we get a chance to do something like this, we jump at it.

Just like he'd jump off a bridge -- just for the fun of it.

Mark Zeske. Robby Gordon to go triple-dipping this week. Sports Illustrated. Posted: Wednesday May 31, 2006; Updated: Wednesday May 31, 2006.

Race Weekends

Last year, Gordon won both the SCORE Trophy Truck and overall 4-wheel vehicle titles in the Tecate SCORE Baja 500 in Ensenada, Mexico. Gordon flew to Dover, Del., immediately after the desert race and finished 29th in the Nextel Cup race the following day at Dover International Speedway.

This year, mmediately following the completion of the estimated seven-hour race, which begins and ends in Ensenada, Gordon will re-board his plane and take an overnight flight to Dover where he will start the Neighborhood Excellence 400 Sunday at 2:10 p.m. EDT. Gordon, who finished 36th, reboarded his plane and took an overnight flight to Dover. He said he fell asleep around 1 a.m. EDT and woke up when the plane landed at 6 a.m. He slept another 4 hours at the track.

The best thing about having such a long flight Saturday night back to Dover is that I’ll get to sleep on the plane the entire trip and be ready for 400 more miles on Sunday. Getting our team’s first win of the season there would put a topper on the whole weekend. On paper, the travel logistics look tough but when it's over, it really doesn't seem like it was all that hard. The races couldn’t be any farther apart. Why couldn’t this be a Phoenix weekend or even a Texas weekend? I’d take that.

Shortly after Gordon starts the 500, his father, Bob, will start in the Hummer H3 where he will also drive half way and then turn the truck over to the younger Gordon who will in all likelihood complete the 424-mile course in the H3. The Hummer in which the elder Gordon will start the race is the same vehicle Robby Gordon raced in January in the Dakar Rally.

By running both trucks, we'll be able to put a lot of development miles on the H3 in preparation for the next Dakar. The H3 has been a very reliable truck but it was built to conform to the rules of the Dakar Rally, and that's the way we will race it in the 500 - so it will be at a horsepower disadvantage to the unlimited horsepower Trophy Trucks.

But my dad has still got what it takes to get the job done, and he doesn't make many mistakes, and if the H3 is as reliable as it has been in the past, we could win with either truck.

I’m looking forward to having my dad back in a Team Gordon truck, and I hope that Andy gets his first win in the Trophy Truck class. He’s a heck of a talent and if all goes well I expect to see him be the first to get back to Ensenada.

Bob Gordon, a longtime off-road racer, is a five-time class champion of the legendary Baja 1000. Bob Gordon for many has been affectionately known as "Baja Bob.” Robby Gordon is a three-time SCORE class season champion. Gordon, considered one of the most versatile drivers in racing, said he had no plans to slow down his hectic schedule.

Golf is a cool sport, but If I’m going to go out and do something, I’d rather go racing.

Robby Gordon Secures Third Baja 1000 Crown

Robby Gordon drove to his third Baja 1000 victory Friday, teamming with 19-year-old Andy McMillin in the 39th running of the off-road event. Gordon, who flew to Homestead-Miami Speedway after the race in time to qualify for cup's season finale, had this to say:

We had a flawless run. We had absolutely no issues and I'm really happy that Andy was able to get her first win with us.

Gordon started 31st out of 36 entries in the premier Trophy Truck division, taking the overall four-wheel lead in the timed race after approximately 450 miles. Gordon had passed every four-wheeled vehicle in the race by the 600-mile mark. Gordon and McMillin completed the 1,050.83-mile event in 19 hours, 15 minutes and 27 seconds.

Larry Roeseler and Troy Herbst finished second in a Class 1 car. B.J. Baldwin and Tom Bradley Jr. were third in a Trophy Truck enty. Of 431 starters, 234 entries finished the race, which began in Ensenada, Baja California.

From staff and wire reports. Robby Gordon secures third Baja 1000 crown. USA Today. Updated 11/18/2006 8:43 PM ET.

McMillin Racing The Corky McMillin Companies is made up of five core companies: McMillin Land Development, specializing in the acquisition and development of large-scale communities; McMillin Homes, responsible for building homes throughout the state of California and in San Antonio, Texas; McMillin Commercial, San Diego's largest commercial developer specializing in office, industrial and retail development; McMillin Realty, San Diego's largest independent real estate firm; and McMillin Mortgage, which underwrites and funds its own loans. What started out to be a ritual of weekend trips to the sand dunes with family and friends back in the 60's has evolved into today's McMillin Racing. Macey L. (Corky) McMillin was inducted into the Off-Road Hall Of Fame in 2006. The Off-Road Motorsports Hall of Fame has been established to recognize and honor those individuals and organizations whose lifelong contributions to off-road motorsports have set a standard for others to follow. Racing since 1976, McMillin Racing represents three generations of racers.

cup driver Robby Gordon believes Indy cars are "too fast for ovals." Now a fixture on the Nextel Cup circuit.

Paul Dana's Death

Paul Dana's death in an Indy Racing League crash was a grim reminder for Robby Gordon of why he raced at Bristol Motor Speedway instead of Homestead-Miami Speedway on Sunday. Gordon, who gave up a promising open-wheel career to race cup full time four years ago.

That's why I left. One hundred percent, no ifs, ands or buts about it. Indy cars are too fast for ovals, and they run ovals every weekend. If I run on ovals, then I'm running around in a stock car with a lot more protection around me and at less speeds as well.

News of the fatality in Florida spread through the Nextel Cup garage about two hours before the Food City 500. It especially was jarring for Robby Gordon, a two-time CART winner who nearly won the Indianapolis 500 in 1999. Gordon compared IRL races on banked ovals such as Homestead with cup's white-knuckle restrictor-plate events at Talladega and Daytona, where cars are bunched in tight packs and big crashes are frequent.

I've always worried about the pointy nose on those things shoving the cars up and right over the top of your head. IRL and Champ Car need to get back together and do more road races.

---

Glossary More. . .

top of page

back a page