IPhone : Creating A Preference To Reopen Last Selected Item In UITable

I would like to allow my application to reopen the last item you select from a UITable. I have to store my preferences inside of my didSelectRowAtIndexPath method like so:

- (void)tableView:(UITableView *)tableView didSelectRowAtIndexPath:(NSIndexPath *)indexPath
{
NSUserDefaults *userDefaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];
[userDefaults setObject:self.carData[indexPath.section][indexPath.row] forKey:kLastSelectedItem];
[userDefaults synchronize];

if ([[UIDevice currentDevice] userInterfaceIdiom] == UIUserInterfaceIdiomPad) {
    //  NSDate *object = _objects[indexPath.row];
    self.detailViewController.detailItem=
    self.carData[indexPath.section][indexPath.row];
   }
}

Then I need to update the setting in viewDidLoad.

- (void)viewDidLoad
{
    [super viewDidLoad];

    NSUserDefaults *userDefaults = [NSUserDefaults standardUserDefaults];

    if([userDefaults objectForKey:kLastSelectedItem]) {
        self.detailViewController.detailItem = [userDefaults objectForKey:kLastSelectedItem];
    }

    self.detailViewController =
(DetailViewController *)[[self.splitViewController.viewControllers
                          lastObject] topViewController];
    [self createCarData];
}

I believe I am missing a call for prepareForSegue in the viewDidLoad method to make sure that kSelected constant contains a value before calling the prepareForSegue method. But the thing is I don't know how. How can I do this?