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FONTANA, Calif. -- Jeff Gordon recalls when he was not even racing's highest-profile Gordon.

It was the early 1990s, and Robby Gordon was the superstar in waiting. He had a contract with Ford, won the Baja 1000 at age 18, claimed road-race victories for Jack Roush at 21 and ruled his class at the 24 Hours of Daytona four consecutive years before Jeff Gordon's rookie NASCAR Cup season in 1993.

"Everybody looked at him as the next prodigy," Jeff Gordon said of Robby. "I was like the second Gordon when I came into the Busch Series."

A career path that bounced among Indy cars, off-road racing and NASCAR kept Robby Gordon from greater glory. Middle-tier rides didn't help. Neither did a temperament that can make Tony Stewart appear tame.

Now Gordon runs a one-car team in a four-car NASCAR world. He's doing more than other single-car teams, but that means little in this Darwinistic sport.

Robby Gordon has a plan, though. He's always thinking about racing, whether it's his race shop's expansion or his car's shocks.

"I don't give up," Gordon said as he stood in a small conference room at his 32,000-square-foot race shop, one a fraction of the size of campuses at Hendrick Motorsports and Roush Fenway Racing.

"What do you want me to do, go drive for somebody else? Why would I want to do it? I have already proved I can win races driving for (Richard) Childress."

Look at what Jeff Gordon became driving for Rick Hendrick.

Bad Robby

"The problem with Robby is," car owner Felix Sabates said, "he is talking when he should be listening."

"Robby is just hard-headed. It's got to be his way or the highway."

Gordon, 38, drove for Sabates in 1997. It was Gordon's first full-time foray into NASCAR after spot starts. Gordon and Sabates split before the season ended. Sabates calls Gordon a friend today and admits that his wife thinks he gave up on Gordon too soon.

Car owner Larry McClure is not as kind. Gordon drove for him in 2001 and ran five races before they parted.

"I guess if you can't say something good, keep your mouth shut," McClure said of Gordon.

John Menard, a friend of Gordon's, has owned Indy cars that Gordon drove, and he sponsored Gordon's rides. He said he has had a few episodes with Gordon, but they never lasted. Menard credits those times to Gordon's drive to race and a propensity to blurt his feelings.

Ricky Johnson, a longtime friend from California, said Gordon's fiery attitude can hurt Gordon as much as it helps him.

"You can't say that as a team owner that you don't want that spark, that temperament and that fight," Johnson said. "You want to be able to contain it, and that's the fear of some team owners is that they can't contain it."

Gordon -- not Stewart -- will end this year on NASCAR probation for the third consecutive year. Gordon earned the latest reprimand for his actions at the end of the Busch race in Montreal last month, when he spun race leader Marcos Ambrose, then ignored NASCAR's order to line up 13th instead of closer to the front.

NASCAR parked Gordon for the next day's Nextel Cup race at Pocono. He enters today's race at California Speedway 27th in points. He sits 104 points out of 21st, which shows how much missing that race hurt.

While Gordon's actions haven't won many friends, he has won some fans.

"I will be the first one to admit that Robby has made his fair share of blunders in the past due to his raw emotion getting to him," wrote Michael J. McBride of Woodbridge, N.J., in an e-mail. "And is there another driver that makes NASCAR Nation's blood boil like Robby can when he is at the center of controversy? But being a Robby fan you have to have thick skin, and realize part of the reason we love him IS because of that raw emotion and desire to win."

Good Robby

Menard sees Gordon's talent every race. Menard, the father of Cup rookie Paul Menard, sees Gordon handling out-of-control cars that others can't.

"He's one of the most naturally talented drivers you'll ever meet," Menard said.

That's a refrain throughout the Cup garage. Many competitors admire Gordon's car control and how he keeps a car from wrecking.

Johnson recalls an off-road race in California where a section of the course featured rough, uneven sections. Some parts dropped more than four feet. Others rose and sent vehicles airborne. Gordon told Johnson that he could keep the accelerator mashed the whole time. Johnson doubted him.

Gordon's truck bucked like an angry bull through the course. The engine snorted, but Gordon didn't back down. He did what he said he would.

"Robby is very aggressive," Jeff Burton said. "He's always a guy that is going to push the issue to try to make something happen whether it's lap 5 or lap 500. That's Robby's style. He drives the car really hard."

Off-road racing might be where Gordon excels most. He drove the first American-made vehicle to victory in a stage of this year's Dakar Rally, an off-road race from Lisbon, Portugal, to Dakar, Senegal. He won the Baja 1000 for a third time last year.

The two-time IROC runner-up ran out of fuel on the last lap while leading the 1999 Indianapolis 500. He scored seven top-10 finishes as CART's only owner/driver that season. He also won two CART races and had five top-10 finishes in 10 Indy 500 starts. He has won three Cup races -- all for Childress -- but hasn't won since 2003.

Few Cup drivers can boast as diverse a resume. Yet the victories don't add to the aura that surrounds Jeff Gordon, a four-time Cup champion who has 79 Cup victories. Few seem to notice Robby Gordon try to build his team and his future.

"Somewhere along the way shifts happen, and my career took off and his seemed to kind of flatten out for whatever reason," Jeff Gordon said. "Maybe he just didn't get with the right teams and the right equipment, but he's gone around the garage an awful lot and hasn't been able to seem to make it work."

Contact Dustin Long at 373-7062 or dlong @news-record.com