The “Million-Mile Lexus” that we brought you updates about last year was quite a machine. Since its creation in the mid-1990s, it covered an amount of miles that would put many cars in the junkyard.
Thanks to its owner, Victor Sheppard, the 2007 Toyota Tundra you see here hit that impressive milestone in less than a decade. Then he kept driving it. Sheppard put most of those 1 million+ miles on his truck by driving an average of 125,000 miles a year for his job, which frequently took him from his home in Louisiana to North Dakota, Wyoming, and Virginia. Some of the numbers on his odometer were due to him taking his Tundra to a dealer 117 times for things such as timing belt replacements, oil changes, and regularly scheduled check-ups.
Sheppard retired his road warrior, which still has its original engine, transmission, and paint job, by handing it over to Toyota. Piece by piece, its engineers will take it apart and study what they did right to make a truck as durable as Sheppard’s and what they can do to make Toyota pickups ever-better.
They’ll probably get another chance to do the same thing several years from now. Sheppard replaced his million-mile Toyota with a 2016 Tundra.
Derek Shiekhi's father raised him on cars. As a boy, Derek accompanied his dad as he bought classics such as post-WWII GM trucks and early Ford Mustang convertibles.
After loving cars for years and getting a bachelor's degree in Business Management, Derek decided to get an associate degree in journalism. His networking put him in contact with the editor of the Austin-American Statesman newspaper, who hired him to write freelance about automotive culture and events in Austin, Texas in 2013. One particular story led to him getting a certificate for learning the foundations of road racing.
While watching TV with his parents one fateful evening, he saw a commercial that changed his life. In it, Jeep touted the Wrangler as the Texas Auto Writers Association's "SUV of Texas." Derek knew he had to join the organization if he was going to advance as an automotive writer. He joined the Texas Auto Writers Association (TAWA) in 2014 and was fortunate to meet several nice people who connected him to the representatives of several automakers and the people who could give him access to press vehicles (the first one he ever got the keys to was a Lexus LX 570). He's now a regular at TAWA's two main events: the Texas Auto Roundup in the spring and the Texas Truck Rodeo in the fall.
Over the past several years, Derek has learned how to drive off-road in various four-wheel-drive SUVs (he even camped out for two nights in a Land Rover), and driven around various tracks in hot hatches, muscle cars, and exotics. Several of his pieces, including his article about the 2015 Ford F-150 being crowned TAWA's 2014 "Truck of Texas" and his review of the Alfa Romeo 4C Spider, have won awards in TAWA's annual Excellence in Craft Competition. Last year, his JK Forum profile of Wagonmaster, a business that restores Jeep Wagoneers, won prizes in TAWA’s signature writing contest and its pickup- and SUV-focused Texas Truck Invitational.
Where do you go for answers when you have a Lexus with a gorgeous leather interior but are not sure about how to maintain that luxurious look? The "Club Lexus" forums, of course.
