Swift Lewiston starting Monday 8/1

Day 12

Forgot to post yesterday. Yesterday hooked a trailer to the bobtail and drove a full 18-wheels around the Lewiston port. Shifting and driving with a trailer is sooo much smother than with a bobtail. Then gotta watch the trailer tracking. Other than that it was range and spotting.

So last night some new personal family issues came up so was really stressed about that. This morning I couldn't get my log sheets to work right to save my life. Had 5 days in a row of perfect logs with no redos and today I go through 6 sheets over a 15 minute range run. Grrrrrr. Not a good way to start the day.

Day turned around really quickly though once I got onto the range. Class before us graduated today and were off to their States to do State tests. Class after us was prepping for pre-trip first attempt evals (all failed. note study pre-trip, study it some more, and when you think you have it, study again). Three class mates were out driving so it was just me and one other for several hours this morning. Was odd having only 2 trucks running on the range.

Got into a rhythm on offsets and nailed every one with no pullups on both sides. Think 2 on one side, 3 on the other. Then my offset truck gets pulled by the shop for B service (think that's oil, filters, lube, etc). For those keeping score offset truck is my Nemesis so that banshee got grounded and another Columbia took it's place. That put an FLD into the 90 deg alley dock and my skills retake is coming up sometime today.

Get pulled off the range for some shifting. Today we actually left the port! Got onto 193 and drove up the Snake River about 25 miles. Four ways running, up to 8, down to 3, up to 8, down to 3. 25 miles, an hour and 15 minutes of driving. Up to 8, down to 3.

Just about 200 yards from the turn around point my brain and muscles gave up and I couldn't shift for crap. Pulled into the turn around, took a break, and swapped drivers.

Came back to Lewiston and went to lunch.

Immediately getting back from lunch I get pulled for skills test. No warning, no setup, no warmup. Okay let's do it. Oh hey look my Nemesis is back from the shop except shes in the 90 deg alley dock instead of the offset. Never driven her anywhere except offset/straight back.

Straightback: Pull up, pull back. No problems. 0 points (remember golf, less points the better).

Offset: I pick blind side. Flubbed the first turn and took a pull-up mulligan and reset it. There's 1 pull-up, get 2 free. Earlier this week I barely tagged a cone for -2. Today I caught it, straightened and did half a pull-up (there's 2). Gear box is fighting be bad and can't get the truck into reverse. Creep forward a bit. Nothing. Feet off clutch and brake, clutch, no gear. Low again creep forward, try again. No go. Finally after about the fourth inch forward and resetting the clutch it goes into reverse. Whew! Put the truck in the pocket perfectly. 0 points.

90 Deg Alley: Jump into my nemesis and set up. Pull back and get the trailer into the pocket perfectly. Back in a bit to give me clearance for a pull-up. Take the pull-up and I'm lined up perfect. Get out to measure, go up and make the ground next to my door.

Grab the door handle and get ready to get in and think to myself mark it in back too just in case. So I walk back to the back again and say I'm going to measure twice and cut once. Mark the back and get in the truck. Pull back about 3 feet and stop. I've got another get out, and 1 pull up. I pull back another 3 inches (remember I was 2 inches shy earlier this week).

Get out and look and my rear bumper is perfectly in the box. My truck's a bit sideways, but straight. I could call it done now, but instead head back up to the cab. Instructor is looking at me odd. Get in, start the engine, straighten the tires, stop the engine, get out and say "I'm done!". Walk up and say "figured I'd make the truck neat while I had freebies left".

Instructor shakes her head and gives me my score sheet. 0 Points. 100% pass. Woohoo!

Still got 45 minutes of range time to burn so jump in an FLD and run the 45 Alley Dock for a while till I get yanked for some more road/shifting.

And holy crap I'm driving an 18 wheel semi truck through Lewiston Idaho. Talk about pucker. At any given time I had at least 3 vehicles in blind spots. Not to mention the guys that think that cutting in front of an 18 wheeler that says "STUDENT DRIVER" all over it is a good idea.

Then there's this bridge that goes from Lewiston to Clarkston. Driving my F150 across it makes me nervous because it's narrower than the regular road, and it's 25mph but everyone goes 35+ across it. We come around the corner and guess what I get to drive an 18 wheeler across. Yup.

Tagged the curb making the corner because Blazer boy in the lane next to me refuses to get up past me and keeps trying to encroach my lane, but I NEED that left side to not hit the curb. Oh well at least I'm not on a test today. Get out of that charlie foxtrot area an onto a more straight stretch to unwind.

After today have a MUCH MUCH higher amount of respect for trucks on the road, and a growing loathing of four wheelers.

Cross a much better bridge to come back. Get back to the range and that's it for today. Shut down and brought in the keys.

Today I think I need a new set of shorts. Thankfully it's Friday. Tomorrow is class room, mapping and hazmat. Sunday is off so plenty of time to decompress and rest.

Starting Monday I'm in the senior class and driving on the roads.

 

Day 14 and 15. (13 was class day)

Sooo tired.

Wife surprised me this weekend and drove up to visit. That was nice but I'm afraid it messed up my sleep schedule and now I've got to reset it again.

Anyways drove Monday in town and didn't go so hot. Got relegated to back country roads...that's fine. Then ran circuits to work on my shifting. Got back and felt much more confident.

Today got out on the road in my element...the whindy two lane mountain road next to a river and no guard rails.

My student partner got the "hug this white line", "get on that yellow line", "hug this white...did you just put my trailer tandems in the dirt". I'm going stir crazy because I want to drive these corners.

Finally stop at a rest area and switch.

I get in, pull out and run up to the governor. "What is the speed limit on this road!?", "65! My speed is 62!", "It is 55 on this road. You country boys get you on these mountain roads and you just want to open it up". "Sorry, making my speed 53". After that the instructor hardly said one word to me cept "up here about 1/2 mile going to make a left". That's a good thing.

Still messed up a few gears but much more comfortable with them now.

Gotta get up even earlier in the morning for some night driving in the morning.

Sidebar update on the new class that started yesterday. Started with 12, down to 7. Few no shows. One guy was flashing his "medical marijuana" card. Really? You're in Idaho, at truck driving school, and you're bragging about having a "medical" pot card? Yea he got booted.

 

At the hotel getting a bite to eat while I'm on lunch.

Will post more details later, but......

I took the Swift Road Test right before lunch and passed! T'was ugly, but I passed!

 

Day 16

Got up early for some night driving. I drove first this morning so did pretrip. Did my run and felt really good about it. Drove up the river to that rest area again and almost missed the turn off. Oops.

Classmate drove back and did his town run.

Got back to the school and I get pulled out for my road test.

I get two yellows just before hitting the stop line, both go red before my cab is pass them. A third light manages to flip to yellow just before I get to the no way to stop in time. Hit the brakes and manage to stop mostly smoothly before the stop line. I swear I heard that stop light cackling at me.

Killed the engine 3 times! Are you kidding me?!?! Once after an emergency stop and left the selector up so tried to go in fifth instead of first. Second and third were stopped on a hill and was so concerned with rolling backwards (auto-fail) that didn't get the brake to accelerator fast enough and killed the engine. Wow, and I've been driving a manual transmission since I could reach the pedals and see over the steering wheel at the same time.

Those were just tragic. Got nailed for a few points for intersection checks. Was going down this main road and there are so many side street intersections and so close together that checking each and every one three times each is just ridiculous. I tried but I know I missed a few.

Few more dings for touching lines and speeding. Think that's about it.

All told it was ugly but a pass. Could have done better, but it wasn't kick me off the street and take my 4-wheeler license away bad like the first few days on the streets. Mostly it's testitis combined with being on town streets.

Went to lunch.

When I got back my classmate took his road test. So I hung out on the range and did a pretrip on one of the range trucks recording it on my cell phone so that I could grade it later. Did better than test day, remembered a few things that I forgot but forgot some new things. Guess my personal miss range is between 12 and 18 out of 23(4?).

Gotta get to sleep again, classmate needs his hour of night driving which means yay I get to get up even earlier today.

 

Well I'm home.

Thursday (Day 17) just took relaxing drives around the area. Stopped at a rest area next to a river and plenty of shade trees for about an hour and studied pre-trip. Didn't do much else new.

Friday (Day 18 ) ... ugh.

State examiner came by at about 6:45 am and I started my exam at 7 am.

Pretrip - scored 6! Which I thought was awesome.

Straightback and Offset - perfect, scored 0.

Alley Dock - WTF?1?1 I hit 2 cones, including one I've never hit before, and couldn't get the thing working right. Finally just took a mulligan pullup to reset the backing. Got into the pocket, but needed a pullup to straighten out the truck.

That pull-up was point 13 so I failed the skills test.

Paid the man $60 for his time and sat around the rest of the day beating myself up.

Still upset about it. I know I've got these skills tests (scored -2/DQ and 0) on previous tests, and the road test is extremely close to the routes we've taken almost every day so I know the roads and corners. Just got serious testitis.

Out of my class 2 passed State. 2 hit curbs on the road test, and I didn't make it to road test.

Can retake in three days (Monday) but I have stuff I have to take care of at home so soonest I can do is Thursday. That's a lot of driving back and fourth on my dime so I take Monday before Orientation since I'm driving up anyways.

I've got a week off basically, then Sunday drive back up, Monday State Exam, Tuesday start Orientation.