Offer from TMC today...

No, but they do cover the basics of route planning in case the Qualcomm goes down.

 

Orientation was very enjoyable. Just play by the rules, listen to the instructors and follow instructions and go with an open mind to learn their ways. The guys that seem to get sent home are the ones running their mouths about how they've been trucking for years etc.

And OUTSTANDING training environment as well, didn't get into a training truck that had more than 500k miles on it.

 

They own a hotel that they put you up in. If you are coming in to get your CDL, breakfast at the hotel and dinner at their "Chrome Cafe" is gratis, experienced and in-experienced CDL holders pay.

We took personality tests in the first week of orientation, and got the results the last day we were in the facility. My result seemed pretty spot on, and they explained how they used that plus our smoking preferences etc to find close trainer matches. I haven't met up with my trainer yet since I got the week off, so only time will tel on that one.

 

So far, everything is great. I'm on a dedicated spot close to my home that is home daily. My fleet manager works on site and the staff is great to work with. My location services 80 locations for the customer that we deliver to, so my biggest challenge is familiarizing myself with each location and how to get into unload areas. Some stores have very tight parking lots which I've had to study satellite images on G Maps for a bit to figure a plan of attack, but most are relatively fine to get into. So far, the company has followed through on all the promises made/expectations set.

Direct load securement training was 3 8-10 hour days, starting Friday and testing out late Sunday evening. The first day was lecturing and quizzing with the instructor, the remaining two were hands on in a separate building that had 4 or 5 trailers set up with a litany of different loads: steel coils (suicide and shotgun), shingles, slinkys, greasy bar, steel plate, skidded coils etc. The loads ranged from pretty much every type of cargo we could be carrying, short of heavy haul or specialized loads.

We spent the weekend stripping and re-securing, critiquing each other's work and getting yelled at when we screwed up. I say getting yelled at, but it was more of the instructors constantly re-inforcing small mistakes we made that could be very real dangers to the public while driving. Best example of this that hit home to me during this was an instance in which my team and I had not properly secured the slack from a 2 inch strap under the buckle, and of course the instructor caught it. He was quick to show how the wind could rip that slack out, which him being an avid Harley rider would have ripped him off his bike if he was aside my trailer or attempting to pass.

Not one group in the lot of us went through the stations less than 3 times until we got the loads right, some of us did the loads more than 5 times until we got it right. The instructor is a hardened former USMC drill instructor, and it is very much part of his personality and instructional technique. He is hysterically funny and takes his job dead seriously. Combined, he was an outstanding instructor, at least for the way that I learn.

Best thing that I took away from the class is that nobody ever died from over securement. So even though loads like lumber should have a strap every eight feet, I end up treating everything as steel and strapping every 4 feet.