When Jeff was a year old his mother, Carol, married John Bickford. Jeff's step- father took him under his "racing wing" and bought him a BMX bicycle and then a Quarter Midget race car when he was 5.
    His stepdad seemed to know that Jeff would become a race car driver because he had him practicing laps in his Quarter Midget soon after he got it.
"We'd take that car out every night after I got home from work and run lap
after lap," John said. "Jeff couldn't seem to get enough of it." By the time he
was 8, Jeff had won his first Quarter Midget championship. Two more followed,
and by the early 1980s, Jeff had also won four class championships in Go-Karts.
Jeff took to the quarter midget cars like he was born to race. He was winning races before he could read or write. Jeff ran quarter-midget races every
weekend somewhere in the U.S. Jeff was winning so frequently in quarter
midgets that at age 9, he was beating drivers 17 and older. On and on he went,
usually racing on dirt and always moving to a higher level of success.
    John says racing was Jeff's idea,and he and Carol made sure Jeff was as safe as possible. "We were always trying to prepare for the next opportunity," Bickford says. "I think
all parents have a certain level of concern, but if he chose skydiving I'd be more
worried than racing."
    Once it was determined that Jeff would be a racer, the family had a decision
to make. By 1985, Jeff's parents knew that their son's future was in racing.
Vallejo, California, was wonderful, but Jeff could get little competition racing
other kids. He needed to race against adults, but he couldn't do that in his
home state because of age restrictions. Then they relocated to Pittsboro,
Indiana, near Indianapolis in 1986 for two reasons. Open-wheel racing was very
popular in the midwest and there were a lot of race tracks in the area. In
addition, Jeff could legally race sprint cars in Indiana with his parents'
permission.
    After moving to Indiana, things were far from easy. Without any full time
income after the move from California, his family survived on the purses that
Jeff won on the track. According to an article in Newsweek, his family "slept in
pick-up trucks and made their own parts. Thats why I think Jeff is
misunderstood by people who think he was born to rich parents."
    Jeff joined the United States Auto Club (USAC) at 16 and was the youngest
person to ever get a license with the group. Jeff won 3 sprint car track
championships before he was old enough to get a drivers license. In the late-
80's, he journied to Australia and New Zealand to compete in sprint car races on
forign soil. He was the 1989 USAC Midget Rookie of the Year.
    He went to high school in Pittsboro and graduated in 1989. He joined the
cross country track team in high school to stay in shape for racing. Often, he'd
leave school early (or skip it entirely) on Fridays in favor of travel to tracks like
Eldora and Winchester. By the time he graduated, he'd already won over 100
races. He won the USAC Midget championship in 1990. That year, Jeff ran 21
USAC Midget Car races. He was the fastest qualifer 10 times, won nine races
and at the age 19 became the youngest Midget class champion ever. The next
year he moved up to USAC's Silver Crown Division (the cars are similar to
Midgets and Sprints but are a lot bigger).
    During 1990, Gordon, looking for new avenues to advance his career, went
to the Buck Baker driving school to try his hand in the big heavy Stock cars, and
he knew right away that he wanted to race the full-bodied Stocks. Baker,
impressed with Gordon's talent, introduced him to businessman Hugh Connerty,
who offered to let Jeff drive his Busch Series car. With the help of Leo Jackson
(Connerty's son-in-law) and Phil Barkdoll, Jeff organized a fledglng effort that
included Ray Evernham, to whom he was introduced through Jackson's crewcheif
Andy Petree. The modest team made its Busch Series debut late in the season
at Rockingham, catching everyone's attention by qualifying on the outside pole.
    His breakthrough year was probably 1991 when he won the coveted USAC
Silver Crown title and, in a year of frenzied racing, moved up to Busch Grand
National competition driving the #1 Carolina Ford owned by Bill Davis and won
rookie of the year honors. The car was sponsored by Baby Ruth in 1992 in
Busch racing and Jeff captured a NASCAR record of 11 pole positions that year.
Winston Cup car owner Rick Hendrick noticed Gordon driving an extremly loose
race car around Atlanta Motor Speedway that year. He waited for the driver to
lose control and wreck but the driver went on to win the race. Hendrick
immediately asked who the driver was and was told that it was "that Gordon kid."
    Hendrick told his general manager, Jimmy Johnson, to sign the kid to a
Winston Cup contract, whatever it took. In 1992, Gordon signed with Hendrick
Motorsports to drive for car owner Rick Hendrick. However, car owner Bill Davis
expected Jeff to drive for him when his team moved up to the Winston Cup.
Rather than jump to Winston Cup competition with an average team that might
not be strong enough to qualify,Gordon signed on the Winston Cup with Hendrick Motorsports car owner Rick Hendrick,the deal of a lifetime, putting him into the elite circle of NASCAR teams.
Many said that his move to the team was a mistake. Crewcheif Evernham
accompanied Gordon to Hendrick Motorsports. At age 21, he ran the final race
of the 1992 season at Atlanta. He came out strong in 1993, winning the
Gatorade 125-mile Quailying race for the Daytona 500. He noticed Miss
Winston, Brooke Sealy, in Victory Lane that day. They married in 1994 and lived
in Huntersville, North Carolina until 1998 when they moved to Highland Beach,
Flordia.