24yo no-lifer, need company / newbie advice.

Thought you were getting CDL at tech school?

Edit: Just reread & saw the mention of difficulty.

Also, you assumed correctly on Prime training length. About 3mos if no boo boos add miles. They credited all truck miles (not individual miles) to the minimum back then. Possible + 10,000mi for incident of merit. Hitting #### or accident.


I think the absolute quickest I took a guy through both licensing & training, and was confident enough in him to be on his own was 2mos. About 1wk for licensing & 2mos to testing out for own truck. Had exceptional skills & previous experience in straight tank trucks years before. Think we ran 6-7000mi/wk. Exceptionally hard running, but that is what he wanted. Think it was one of the fastest they allowed, so not the norm.

Longest was over 6mos, but was another retired guy & he wanted to stay to learn as much as he could for confidence. Wasn't in it for the $ and did not need it. Fulfilling a life long dream.

Good chance one would not have same instructor for licensing take through training portion. Many, many more trainers than certified instructors.

 

Just remembered another exceptional student. 24yr old IL farm boy. What a guy.

Friend did his licensing & I agreed to do his training portion. Think he finished in 2 or 2 1/2mos. Think truck may have had a shop visit during.

Kid was best driver with the best work ethic I ever met. Personality & maturity to match.

Could drive circles around most old timers I have known & could blindside like nobody I have ever seen. In fact, he would blind side at times just to get my goat. (I will usually blindside only if necessary). Kid pulled off some amazing blindside only docks that blew away many old timers. What was even better, he looked like he was only 16. The looks on folks faces when he jumped out will last me till my dying day.

 

Licensing should be pretty much super solo, Instructor monitoring in passenger seat. Will drive any hours he has left before/after you as needed.

Training will work into team, depending on how soon trainer begins to feel trust enough to sleep & students ability to adapt to odd hours & gradually longer drive times.

Again, depends on individual. But, I would say usually about a week or two in it will be mostly teaming throughout training phase.

The trainer will be the one losing the way more sleep (at least SHOULD be), especially at first. Heck of lot to be teaching & monitoring, but will go down as rapidly as you learn. Eventually, it will mostly be running opposing shifts with one asleep while other driving, but for questions & any issues.

Believe it or not, am/was the same way as you w/same reservations. But, if your really running..... the time goes by way faster than you even imagine it would. Time perception is a very strange thing. It's over before you know it. (Unless you draw a #######, then you handle with office in appropriate manner). I was willing to bite the bullet & do whatever it took to at least get started

I actually really enjoyed my own training process, but I also got lucky & had some golden experienced guys that ran me through that are friends to this day. You can see my original thread under Prime.

FullMetalJacket at Prime

Never, ever could have imagined I would have ever considered instructing & training, especially as long as I did. Especially, when one almost killed us dangling truck off a huge mountainside cliff. Yes, I still finished his training ( reason.... he was Marine having hard life times) & continued on with more. Almost DID quit then, though. LOL

 

No CDL training?

GO BACK & READ THE WHOLE AD WHEN EXPANDED -- it mentions CDL training, as well.

-- L

 

Oh yeah @Spartananator,

Wherever you get in......

If I had to do it all again & I was your age, I would definately have started in flatbed, tanker or both, or switched over as soon as possible after training.

Far more opportunities to advance in far more lucrative specialization.

Intended to do them all, but got wrapped up in the day to day hustle & now to old w/health issues to attempt now.

Plus, the operational hours are much more conducive to a healthier & more normal life.

If you have the interest, definately encourage going that way from the start. You can ALWAYS pull a #### reefer or box.

 

Easily....one of the best posts I have read here on the Forum...in a while.

-- L

 

@Spartananator,

Since you mentioned flatbed at beginning, going to try & summon an old friend that resurfaced a few months ago. Saw his nose in here once or twice monitoring, maybe he will get a notification.

He started skateboarding not long after I started reefer, then few years later made leap into OS/OD. Was loving life & cleaning clock till some life issues caused him to give it up.

He was supposed to have been trying to coming back out, but haven't heard anything back yet. May well be busy as heck working his way back in.

@Broshears you out there Bud?

Time to come out of hiding & sling some info! LOL

 

If flatbed is your desire, you should try to jump in/create thread in the Flats section.

There's a lot of great guys with way more years experience than you've been alive.

I believe a few have actually been around since stone was first fashioned into the wheel.....