David Gilliland is taking a detour – on foot – on his way to Las Vegas Motor Speedway this week. The driver of the No. 38 Front Row Motorsports Ford will be part of a group hiking more than 20 miles of trails through the Grand Canyon Tuesday and Wednesday.
Gilliland purchased about 40 pounds of gear to carry on the hike, a trip where he will sleep in a sleeping bag and tent on the canyon floor.
“Even though I grew up out west, I’ve never seen the Grand Canyon and I’ve always wanted to. This way I’ll be able to see it all at once. It’s going to be hard. I’ve done three smaller hikes before but nothing like this. I’m going to have a yellow (rookie) stripe on my backpack for sure.
“We’re going down the hardest trail, too. It’s about eight and a half miles in, and then we have a 13-and-a-half-mile hike out. I’m going to be wishing that Love’s Travel Stops had a store on the bottom of the Grand Canyon.”
UPDATE: David Gilliland tweeted that he has completed his Grand Canyon hike and is now on his way to Las Vegas to race this weekend. What did he say about his journey?
“Just made it out of the Grand Canyon! Hardest/coolest thing I’ve done!!! Wow.”
Enjoy these beautiful images, courtesy of David Gilliland and Front Row Motorsports:
Fans might remember Gilliland’s first attempt to qualify for a NASCAR national series race was at Las Vegas Motor Speedway in 2003 in the Truck Series. But a lot more fans will recall his first win the in the Nationwide Series at Kentucky Speedway in 2006.
Gilliland has seven Sprint Cup career starts at Las Vegas Motor Speedway with a top finish there of 14th in 2009.
“Vegas, to me, drives a lot like Charlotte Motor Speedway. We were able to test in December there at Charlotte and work on some new rule packages that NASCAR sent out, and I feel like the cars drove better when we were there. I felt like we were more competitive in a big group than we had been at the mile-and-a-halfs. We feel like we’re definitely headed in the right direction with that program. We’ve got an extra day of practice out there that’s really going to help us, too.
“The rules changes are definitely going to help teams like Front Row Motorsports. With these cars, that aero platform and aero balance are going to be a lot easier to achieve. I think it’s going to make the racing better and hopefully Front Row and my team can benefit from that.”
NASCAR’s Sprint Cup Series will race in the Kobalt 400 at Las Vegas Motor Speedway on Sunday March 9th. Television coverage by FOX begins at 2:30 pm ET with the green flag starting the action at 3pm ET. Radio coverage is on PRN and Sirius XM, channel 90.