Got my CDL today

There were 6 people that showed up today to take the test . When we got there no one wanted to go first so I said I would. The DMV guy showed up and I went and did the Pre-trip, backing and then road test. Got back to the VDOT lot and he told me congratulations, you passed. Man, it felt like a ton was lifted off my shoulders. The next guy went and failed the road test because he ran a stop sign. The third guy passed and then the next three failed. Two out of six passed and all the failures were for either running a stop sign, red light, over a curb and the last one cut the final corner too close coming back into the yard and put the trailer down in the ditch. It didn’t hurt the truck or trailer, but he failed him for it. I am by no means an expert, but I am ready for the real training to begin. I go to Cincinnati next Sunday and start orientation for Boyd Bros the following Monday. That is when the real training will begin.

 

The part that kills me is we (class) have driven every road that the DMV guy took us down countless times. Each time the instructors would say, watch this stop sign, watch this light and so on. The guys just got in the truck and brain farted while the man was in the truck with them. Don't get discouraged by the numbers with my group. Each one of them should have passed, but did it to themselves. In my opinion, each of the failures had nothing to do with the training, just following plain old road signs. The guy that ran the red light just had a city bus in front of him. The light turned green and the bus took the turn. Instead of watching the light, he just followed the bus around the corner, but the light had turned while the bus was in its turn, thus making it red by the time he got to it. The two guys that cut the corners had not done that while we were in the class. I think that nerves got the best of them because the tester was sitting in the seat beside them.

I actually went back to the test site after going to get my picture taken at the DMV and watched the other guys. I sat there and listened to them tell our instructor what they did wrong. The instructor asked me if I would help him out and take the truck back to the yard and he would pick me up and bring me back to my truck. I said sure, so I got my first solo run yesterday too. When he picked me up I told him "that was fun, not having one of you in the passenger seat" and he just smiled and said, "I figured you would like that."