About

Rory Roberts

Born and raised in North Texas, Rory Roberts began frequenting the local racetrack with his family at age six. Mesmerized by his dad racing dirt track modifieds, it was there he caught the ‘car bug.’ Soon after, illustrating and working on cars became the norm – by age 15, Rory had completed his first street rod while continuing to ‘soup-up’ cars. At age of 24, he earned a degree in Advertising and Design with honors.

Most weekends you would find Rory restoring classic cars while taking on custom airbrush jobs in his spare time. Setting his sights on drag racing, Rory spent a considerable amount of time educating himself on techniques to increase horsepower and tune suspensions. He designed and built his own door slammer from the ground up for which he received several awards, including from AER Manufacturing. Rory then began a new project: teaming up with a life-long friend to build a 1955 Chevrolet truck. The “Double Nickel” truck was featured in Custom Classic Trucks magazine and showcased at the Dallas Autorama.

In 2007, Rory went to work for Unique Performance as a line supervisor for the Chip Foose Camaro project until the closing of the company. He met Joey Riley soon after, and they began restoring high quality builds together. Eventually they knew it was time to start a performance company of their own, and Riley Performance Motorcars (RPM) was born. Shortly after starting RPM, they were granted a license from Carroll Shelby/Shelby America. Since that time, Rory and Joey have produced numerous beautiful mustangs for Shelby America, and additional award-winning automobiles for clients all over the country. Riley Performance & Restoration has now been rebranded to Red River Customs due to the national presence of building the custom Cha Cha Nova for Shirley Muldowney. Rory prides himself on his ideas and one-off designs. His creative skills and drive for perfection have contributed to the company’s success.