mikey b's prime experience

Congrats on getting some backing practice. From an old man to a young man when backing (I know - sleeping mode on) never worry about what others may say or the ribbing you may get if you get out of the truck and walk the trailer prior to backing. It's your load, your responsibility and it's your fanny on the line.

I don't know who said it on TTR but it's a quote I kept in my vault of OTR driving tidbits: "Never THINK you can make it, when KNOWING is only a 53' walk." I guess that's 106' if you walk back to the cab. You're off to a great career and many, many adventures. Enjoy the ride and keep us posted.

 

It's much safer to learn the basics of driving a trailer (backing) in the semi controlled environment of the training pad than at a truck stop with super Trucker barreling through at 40mph. Idiots out on the road will get in the way on purpose as soon as they see you are practicing. Not so out on the training pad.

 

Hey I don't drive 40mph in there any more I do 35 and the only reason why I get in the way is to make sure they don't hit anything...ha...no its better to do backing on the pad as you said I got a lot of backing practice at t/s and customers when I was psd if we had to back the majority of the time I did it

 

Get the hard stuff going forward under control before adding the hard stuff going backward.

 

Good Job Mikey B! Those first few over nights area killer, but they get better.

 

O ya they do! lol I remember the first few times. I didnt make it far. Before I finished tnt I could drive all night with one stop. Actually did a couple times 11 hours straight overnight no stops... That was a bad idea in so many ways....

 

Great points everyone. The way Prime does it is they send you our for 100 hours of PSD training to teach you how to drive the truck then come in and practice in a controlled environmentthe backing portion. Not to say if instructor feels that you can practice on the road he won't let you. The CDL test backing portion is done in a controlled environment. Once you have your CDL and you go with trainer for the mileage portion you will have lots of backing practice in real world environment. I could be wrong, but I think that's how it works. If I'm not mistaken that's how they do it at the schools too. I mean the backing portion.