Experienced driver vs new grad question.

I know what you're saying, I've been driving 8 years, I can drive, but I have to go with a trainer too. I spent a month with a trainer on flatbed in 05 but my recent experience has been in daycabs home every night. I don't mind though, I want to learn all I can.

 

7 months with a trainer? I've never even heard of that, not even if you are doing bad enough to make you stay with him. They would normally have let you go long before that if you just weren't getting it. You're a better man for doing it than me. And for free?

All that aside, I've been driving big trucks for over 20 years. I got sick and spent a year and a half being disabled. I got better and decided to try OTR. First, they required me to take a refresher course at the community college, which I did and went through the motions even though I kept my CDL when I was sick. They also made me ride with a trainer for 3 weeks as well. What I ran into, which I assume you are running into as well, is that " truck driving " and " driving trucks " are 2 different things. I didn't know the first thing about being a " truck driver " until I went out with a trainer. I can drive any truck out there. I learned on a farm driving a "two-stick Mack" (how many of you old hands remember those?) pulling cotton wagons to the gin when I was still in high school. I drove better than the trainer. But I realized I didn't know the first thing about " truck driving ".

Go out with the trainer and learn all you can because the less you know, the lonelier this job will be once you're by yourself.

 

You obviously want to work for this company. Just suck it up and do your last 3 weeks "training" with them. Maybe you can ask them if they can put something in writing.

There's a lot of things about trucking that just don't make sense at times, but in the overall scheme of things, another 3 weeks is nothing if this is really the company you're sure is right for you.

 

before i retire met a driver in lebo kansas, he was with a young driver. i thought the older driver was the trainer but i was wrong. the older driver had driven for 47 years retired his wife had died and he just wanted something to do. had a hard time finding a job because had been off the road for about a year. so was forced on to one of the mega carriers, i dont think it was because of his age, because he was a pretty sprey guy. this young driver was trying to blow smoke to me about how it was on the road. come to find out he had been driving about a year. that young driver was missing a golden chance to learn something, and he was letting it get away from him. do the couple weeks and continue on . lots of luck

 

3 weeks after spending 7 months with a trainer? Seems like a small price to pay if that is the carrrier you want to go with.

 

OK look..... The reason you should go out with a trainer is not to learn how to drive.

The reason you WANT to go out with a trainer is BECAUSE YOU NEED TO BE EXPOSED TO FLATBEDDING THE MAVERICK WAY. Someone may be the Mario Andretti of Semi Truck driving, but give them a spread axle flatbed and have them load 2 Shotgun coils, One Eye to the Side coil, and four large sheets of steel on one work assignment, and expect them to be able to handle it correctly, safely, and legally, then driving that load 700 miles without having it fall off and kill someone, or be damaged along the way...... well.... maybe you are starting to see why going out with a FLATBED DRIVING INSTRUCTOR is something that EVERYONE should want to do, regardless of whether or not they have ever driven a big truck and can call themselves "experienced." If I had driven for awhile- say a box van or a container trailer, I know I would be scared crapless to get a w/a like the one I just dreamed up as my first work assignment as a new flatbedder, and had never gone out with a trainer to get some exposure to it.

 

and by the way....that is exactly the very first work assignment that I got on my very first load. Don't believe me?? Look at my profile and look at the photo albums I have. Was I nervous about it? Ask Sarge, I am sure he can recall.

 

Three weeks will go by fast. Just do it.

 

I would rather go with a trainer. I know there's more to this job than driving the truck. Don't want to be thrown to the wolves.