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John Bickford is a man of vision.

Now that may seem like a pretty powerful statement to make about the unassuming, avuncular gentleman who stands before me in a camo rain suit, but Bickford tells stories about how he arrived at this point in life as if they had always been planned that way.

You have to remember the unlikely odds that Bickford disregarded. The way it was before his step-son, Jeff Gordon, became a household name.

Bickford raised Jeff from the time he was one year old. Early on, it became evident that Gordon was not going to excel at stick and ball sports, so Bickford put the young Gordon behind the wheel of a Go-Kart. And the rest, as they say, is history.

Bickford's vision and Gordon's talent came together perfectly, and as the manager of Jeff Gordon Incorporated, their partnership continues today at Hendrick Motorsports. When Bickford isn't overseeing the many facets of JGI, you can find him in the woods, and there's nowhere he'd rather be than in the American west during the rut, when the elk are bugling and the mule deer are on the move all day.

Bickford is talkative and friendly on the drive out to the hunting grounds. He discusses the Winery he and Jeff have been working on for some years now, about his climb up Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and about future hunts and places he'd still like to see.

Bickford goes after both mule deer and elk on the show, and it's obvious he's spent time at the shooting range- a smart move in these big western landscapes. He loves to hunt mule deer but elk are his admitted favorite.

He talks about how they carry themselves, how they hold their head high and seem to know they are the king of the mountain.

Perhaps he feels a kindred spirit with an animal so confident, so self assured.

The truck drives on the little rut that passes for a road until it just disappears into the Montana high prairie. Before us lay the buttes of the Powder River, and the mule deer, hidden away in the shadows of this badland-like landscape.

Bickford is uncommonly quiet as he straps on his pack and checks his rifle. He stares up at the jagged peak we are about to ascend. I wonder if there is a vision of how this day should unfold going on his head. He turns and smiles with a simple "We're off!" and I follow, curious to see how this vision unfolds.