Meet Las Vegas’ latest racing sensation: Michael Gaughan

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South Point owner Michael Gaughan.
Photo: Steve Friess

Michael Gaughan has always been a kind of rough-and-tumble sort. That is true whether he is donning his Resistol and Wranglers while hosting a bevy of National Finals Rodeo events at his South Point hotel-casino, or strapped snugly into an old Dodge Ram and tearing across the Mexico and Southern California desert.

Unafraid of having his 69-year-old body rattled like an oversized maraca, Gaughan won his class -- Vintage, appropriately enough -- a few weeks ago at the 2012 NORRA Mexican 1000 off-road race. The four-day event wrapped May 2. The stages were from Mexicali to Bahia de Los Angeles on Day 1, Bahia de Los Angeles to Loreto on Day 2, and from Loreto to La Paz and finally the finish in San Jose Del Cabo on Days 3 and 4.

A competitive racer, off-and-on, for at least 40 years, Gaughan finished the course (closer to 1,200 miles than 1,000) in 13 hours, 44 minutes, 58 seconds. He beat the 2nd-place finisher, Mark McMillin, a longtime friend and competitor of Gaughan’s, by less than a minute.

“It helps that you get to rest every day,” said Gaughan, the father of NASCAR racer Brendan Gaughan (who drove the final leg of the race, as the primary drivers were permitted some relief from a teammate). “Every day, we’d start at 8 a.m., finish at 2 or 3 in the afternoon, have a couple of margaritas and go to bed.”

The Mexican 1000 is no mere exhibition. It is a serious event, said to be the first to use “off-road” in its official title when the series was launched in 1966. The overall title was won by one of racing’s greatest and, without a doubt, most versatile drivers, Robby Gordon. Gaughan finished 4th overall in a field of more than 80 drivers.

Gaughan navigated the course in a 1978 Dodge Ram charger. The Vintage class did not categorize drivers by their ages, but rather by the ages of their vehicles, 25 years or older. The division was open to drivers of any legal driving age.

Gaughan won the division a year ago, too, and plans to enter next year at age 70. As he says, “Next year, I’m going for a three-peat.”

Follow John Katsilometes on Twitter at Twitter.com/JohnnyKats. Also, follow “Kats With the Dish” at Twitter.com/KatsWithTheDish.

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