Focusing your eyes when driving.. never talked about or taught

A a small excercise in how tunnel vision works and how being 'hypnotized' by the road affects you; on a near empty road look only forward. Let your focus move from near to far and back ag but never side to side. You'll gradually see your periphery and then, slowly, closer to center start going grey or black, depending on time of day. There's a reason your told to look to your sides and down at the gauge cluster, far forward and never stop moving your eyes. I'd try to avoid any type of set pattern, though.

 

Driving well is about maintaining adequate space.

Ever hear, “Can’t fix stupid?” Thats YOU if you EVER allow yourself to be boxed in. It’s a vision problem. Pattern recognition and commensurate actions.

Trained reactions. Versus bad habits.

Overtaking traffic has to be managed. Back off to get them around. If a backup of cars behind the passing truck occurs ITS YOUR FAULT.

They travel in packs. Cars and big trucks. The foreigners hurry to catch a pack because the mental work of driving is so hard for them (no, I’m not kidding).

Losing lanes? Construction? Expect others to rush in. Back off early.

OTOH, I don’t EVER give up ROW. A courtesy, not a requirement. These days, even the trucks don’t let you back over. I just wave as they smoke it onto the shoulder. (Okay, not always, but you give up ROW, you lose standing in court).

There’s always a comfortable rocking chair between the packs. That’s the goal: everyone is a half-mile away.

You train your vision for SOLUTION.

You’re not doing it well until a near-emergency hard brake app is maybe 2X every 100k Miles. That’s New Guy Decent.

No brakes on starting a turn.

Able to accelerate in a turn right from its apex.

You never graze curbs or hit potholes.

Your almost the highest fuel economy your company.

And you might be ready after a while for a $100k job like Haz Mat tanker.

Momentary goal: The Rocking Chair.

Long Term? The hairy-chested dangerous stuff.

(Tailgating cause you’re pissed thirty seconds of a 10.5-hr day means you failed, SWIFT driver).

Easy answer is always look as far as the road extends. And slow for what you can’t.

Hey, another wet & misty morning. A road you’ve run a thousand times . . . but around the bend is a busload of Girl Scouts just turned over . . . and one of them has a mommy who is an Emmy Award-winning executive producer at NBC Television.

Pills or 12-gauge?

.

 

As a deaf man I have to see everything in visual range. There are certain body language cues that are like a fire alarm bell to me. I know what the other person is fixing to do before they know what they want to do. If I am correct in my assessment of the situation, I ask myself what is the worse case scenario right now?

At that point Im already evading after So and so's shaky front end tire blew and put him into the bridge pillar under Canton Ave. I did not necessarily see that shaky front end of that vehicle in traffic. But when I look at 5 lanes ahead of me I latch instantly onto anyone who is out of place, does not belong or otherwise going to be a problem.

When I am walking in Atlanta Petro and someone's body langauge is erect, stiff and muscles are out for fight and flight then I examine the feet, if they decide to take one step towards me, Im already evading. The second step which will be more obvious and insistent as they try to establish a attack on me I already know I am in a fight And it's going to be resolved right quick. I hate fights.

If I was angry with Mr dispatcher, so and so and stupid load blew up and killed the truck and everyone blamed me and I am dragging my feet, hunched shoulders, chin down, eyes down and tears etc wallowing in self pity etc. Then every predator in the place is moving a thousand steps towards plucking me like a victim prey that I truly am. I'll never see them coming.

Your eyes do not sit in one place. You get to staring. Then your mind just goes blank. Until a waitress slaps you for eyeballing her clevelage.

Thank you ma'am for that wake up call I was in a seizure at that moment.

Keep your eyes moving. Your world is a story book way better than any hollywood movie. sooner or later you seperate and work on the few things that ar e a threat to your day long before they involve you directly.

I will condense another thought and say this once using broad terms. I am not a nut, not a crazie nor I am a escaped sanitarium patient. Once in a while I'll be rolling 18 wheels fat dumb and happy having had dinner and a smoke with 400 miles to go into the night.I pass a bull that is as large as a tradesman van of the 70's leaning in the barbed wire.

I get a very fast flash of a certain color and a feeling of shift that is only a minute involving that bull.

I very quickly build a do and do not list and try to understand why the bull will be problem in some way.

1- hide is exact color of old style pavement in OK/TX Border lanes.
2- at night you want some one ahead of you so that when THEY find the bull hopefull no one is hurt
3-prepare mentally updating your current first aid supplies, local numbers for EMT etc.

In essence you expect someone to be hit by a bull. Or a bull to hit you.

So when the sitaution is presented to you at 40 mph of the bull standing in your road at a blind curve being hit by the car in front of you you already had make room for stopping in a orderly manner.

In short you have experienced a animal collision long before you actually arrived in the middle of one ahead of you. You function better and help people faster.

Keep those eyes moving. Look for that which does not belong. A large Nun standing in the howard street bus stop clutching her sides as if she has very painful ribs today.

Hold on there. You are looking at a possible terrorist with a under clothing bomb.

At some point people will decide I am the nut and cart me off with strong medicine. They will need alot more of where that came from. And a chess board.

 

ALWAYS know where you out is!
I was taught that when your tired,you’ll stop checking your mirrors.

 

Well, I'm one of the ones who don't care how big the girls knockers are in the coming up on my left. The only things I care about are: what is around and ahead of me, what are they about to do, and what am I about to do.

I don't have a lot of head movement so I get a lot of those super four wheelers hanging in my mirrors waiting for me to look directly at the mole on their nose so they can go. Doesn't bother me anymore, I know they're there and I don't care about the head shakes, the pretend to cut me off to try and scare me or the throwing of their hands.

No one other than yourself can tell you how to pay attention, as long as you know what's going on around you and what's about to happen, you should know how to respond and that's about as safe as you can get.

 

Routines on scanning key things are always needed, situational awareness come with it.

Start here


4 Step Instrument Scan - AOPA

 

Obviously..you guys never played road rash..

 

Get the big picture! This is one thing taught by the Smith system. The thing is that Big Picture depending on where you are is constantly in flux! No, I am not talking about Dr. Emmett Brown's Flux capacitor from that movie. I am using that word flux because it best describes the fluid nature of traffic FLOW! I spoke to a driver some time ago that made contact with a car that had just run a light. His focus was ahead and was only taking note of the lights not really watching what the traffic on that cross street was doing. Of course he was not charged or was at fault, however, he did miss a VERY important delivery that was a service failure. The customers in most situations don't care why! They just want their product. I spoke to another driver several years ago that had run over something that damaged an airline in his trailer. He was honest about what happened. Had his music up so dang loud he did not hear the noise this made and was not scanning his pressure gauges until the bells started going off. He lost so much air pressure by then he was locked down on the I 610 loop near Katy Texas. You MUST scan those mirrors and those instruments CONSTANTLY! You get that Big Picture then 2 seconds later you get another one. This also comes into play when in a yard trying to back. I can't count the times I seen a driver "properly" clear an area then develop tunnel vision and hit something that had got in that now no longer clear area.

I for one am glad the OP made this thread. This can be a lesson for green drivers. It also explains a lot for me because it is why do dang many drivers can't seem to be able to operate more than a few months without a preventable. You have to do more than GOAL. You must also account for the changing dynamics of your situation.