OK, But Is the Toyota Tundra TRD Pro Good at Truck Stuff?
Last Minute home projects put our yearlong review Tundra to work.
I have a theory about why everyone is driving a truck these days: Folks grew tired of asking their bros to borrow theirs for a weekend run to Ikea, the hardware store, or the dump. Sooner or later, everyone needs a truck. My personal need for a truck skyrocketed when my wife and I bought our first home. Weekends, once reserved for rest and relaxation, were now reprioritized for home improvement and landscaping projects.
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With that in mind, when the possibility of shepherding our yearlong review 2023 Tundra TRD Pro came along, it wasn’t just its off-road chops that I was excited about—it was having access to a truck for a year. Just think of all the projects we could cross off our never-ending to-do list.
With our Tundra’s yearlong stay in our garage near its end, I made sure its last few weeks with us were truck’n busy.
The Payload
With time in the Tundra quickly dwindling, my wife and I decided to tackle the most hauling-heavy project on our docket: redoing our front yard. We’d been slowly chipping away at the project for months, leveling the ground and clearing away mounds of weeds, wood chips, and non-native plants, but we’d finally reached the point where we needed gravel for the pathways and mulch for our newly planted garden beds.
I am unapologetically cheap. If given the choice between spending $200 on delivery or making six separate trips over four days to haul 4,500 pounds of gravel and a ton and a half of mulch, I'll always make the wrong decision and do it myself. What better way to put our Tundra TRD Pro’s 1,449-pound payload to use?
With that capacity in mind, I decided break down the load into separate 1,500-pound trips, unloading between each trip. Efficient? Not exactly, but it would though give me the opportunity to drive our Tundra for an extended period while slightly overloaded (as many customers often do).
