Tucked around the side of a Shermer road office building lie gas pumps, mower blades mounted on plaques, sculptures of longhorn steers and a myriad of buttons and signs displaying the word “mow” in just about all imaginable forms.

This crowded office in Northbrook is the throne of “Mr. Mow It All,” Bruce Kaufman, the President of the U.S. Lawn Mower Racing Association, or USLMRA.

Twenty years ago, Bruce and others were doing public relations work for a corporation called Gold Eagle Company that produces products to aid engine function. As part of their job they were marketing a product called STA-BIL that keeps gasoline fresh. They heard about a riding lawn mower race in England and went there to promote the product. It was at that race that they first saw men and women mounting riding mowers and taking off along oval shaped dirt tracks.

“We just fell in love with the culture [of the sport] and the people and the whole fact that it was all amateur fun motor sport, so we decided ‘let’s bring it across the pond,’” Bruce said.

Bruce and his colleagues working for the company founded USLMRA and over Labor Day weekend in 1992 held the first ever official lawn mower race. Thirty racers attended along with CNN, WGN and crowds of people getting in on the historic moment.

“It’s been mow mow mow ever since,” Bruce said with a laugh.

Now Bruce spends most of his summer weekends surrounded by the bales of hay that border racing tracks across the country and souped-up mowers racers purchased, built from scratch, found rusting behind junk piles or picked up for 20 dollars along the side of the road.

“We are usually at county fairs and festivals on a nice warm summer evening with people traveling literally hundreds and hundreds of miles to race for 20 minutes in a dirt track for no money to get bugs in their teeth and then go home,” said Bruce.

To offset the bugs and the trek, Bruce says the USLMRA does its best “to hold a really well run and fun event.”

According to Bruce, races typically include a meet and greet with the racers before the green flag goes down. Throughout a race day, there is time for racers to stand around and talk about the modifications they have made to their engines and to catch up. Nighttime at the race tends to include storytelling around a campfire.

“We get people from all walks of life,”  said Bruce. “Every type of person you could imagine coming together with a common bond and I’m like the mother hen…Mr. Mow It All leading his flock.”

Additionally, many races include themes and traditions unique to the region they are being held in.

“[In Texas] all the racers bring homemade pie and lots of stuff on a stick,” said Bruce with a chuckle. “In a place like Maryland, traditions? It’s eating crab cakes.”

Bruce’s daughter Zoë Kaufman, a junior, said one of her favorite traditions is when all the racers and people in the stands sing the national anthem together before a race starts.

Despite the “tongue in cheek” nature of the sport, the machines can reach speeds of up to 50 miles an hour, and, according to Bruce, they keep getting faster every year.

Helmets and neck guards are a requirement of racing as are long sleeve shirts, over-ankle boots and a machine and track inspection.

In lawn mower racing, even these have some fun to them. According to Zoë, racers often have bumper stickers and slogans decorating their machines, and Bruce said that racers occasionally dress up as characters.

“One guy…actually made his lawn mower replicate a Shelby Mustang car,“ said Bruce. “One guy dressed up as Ki-mow-sabi and [another as] the Lawn Ranger.”

Though Bruce has never raced, his son Ari, a sophomore, and Zoë now compete in lawn mower races when they have time.

“It’s kind of scary, but it’s fun,” Zoë said.

For Bruce, it meant he got to join the “nervous dads’ club,” which is what he calls the fathers who cluster around the track, cheering on their racing kids.

Kids as young as ten can begin racing, and though Zoë and Ari don’t race often due to the travel, Bruce said there has been a rise in the interest in kids’ lawn mower racing, and any students interested can contact him or visit (http://www.letsmow.com) to get involved.

“The mow the merrier,” Bruce said.

So far the sport has continued to grow, and running the USLMRA is now Bruce’s full time job.

“I keep pinching myself everyday how lucky I am to be doing this because it’s awesome,” said Bruce. “I love doing it. I’m living the dream.”