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A gathering sandstorm sets Barry Sheppard's eyes into a squint as he walks, head down, around the back of the semitrailer. It is hard to surmise whether he is angry or embarrassed. Likely both. It is late. And this is ridiculous.

Ten hours into a 1,057-mile haul from Fort Worth, Texas, to Phoenix, Sheppard has pulled into a truck stop at the western edge of El Paso, about 11 p.m., to bed down in his sleeper compartment. A handful of rigs sit docile in a sandy lot aside the Super 8 motel. One axle in, his black trailer is set like a hook. Buried in sand. It very much resembles a beached whale, except, of course, for NASCAR driver Clint Bowyer's beaming likeness and the Jack Daniel's logo emblazoned on the side.

"I don't believe this," Sheppard sighs.

This is no rookie mistake. At 49, the salt-and-pepper-haired Virginian has been driving these rigs for nearly 30 years, shepherding the rolling work shop/car transporter/command centers that are NASCAR haulers for the past 13. He has won skill competitions. He could probably parallel park his rig on a city street.

But there he stands, waiting for a tow truck big enough for such oversized loads to find its way to the Flying J. There is probably some irony in that Bowyer's father, Chris, financed his son's start in racing with his wrecker business in Emporia, Kan. Sheppard doesn't seem in the mood for irony.

Yet again, the great expanse, the great experience that is the open road has proven a fickle partner.

Different breed

There are popular men and respected men, and then there are the ones who almost seem to be the hub on which everything rotates. Sheppard's presence seems to energize his fellow drivers as they pack their haulers Monday morning. Everyone is seemingly in the process of greeting him or answering him as they quartermaster their transporters with cars, parts, pieces, even the drinks and snacks that will make the race team run at the next stop.

Sheppard came to NASCAR with the legendary Wood Brothers team that was based in his hometown of Stuart for almost a half-century. The former mail carrier and tanker driver began making parts runs to Charlotte, N.C., for the team in 1994, filled in on a race weekend as the hauler driver and took the job full time two weeks later. Sheppard left the team when it moved to the Charlotte area in 2004, but with Richard Childress Racing just 52 miles from his home, the man affectionately known as "Hillbilly" quickly found a new team.

Sheppard says he has yet to feel any more pressure driving 80,000-pound NASCAR rigs than the cargo he hauled back in Virginia.

"This whole thing, rig and all, is maybe $3-million," he says. "Hell, I used to have $6-million in stamps in my truck."

That doesn't mean this is easy. Thirty-six points races a year, from Sonoma, Calif. (the most scenic of drives, he says) to Las Vegas (brilliantly illuminated as haulers crest the mountains to the east) to Loudon, N.H., and Homestead, where the season ends in one week. There are tens of thousands of miles between races and tests, hours of packing and unpacking the transporter, either after the rest of the team leaves or before it arrives.

But Monday all of that melds into the hill and dale of the open road once he is comfortably away from the sprawl of urban Dallas/Fort Worth. The squawk of CB chatter on channel 19 finally grows tired of the small plane he'd passed crashed on the side of Interstate 20. A man could have his thoughts out here. Maybe that's why he keeps a tape recorder on the dash just a short reach from his can of Timber Wolf.

"No. There's not enough tape in the world for that," he jokes.