Hello everyone! Just wanted to introduce myself. I'm 40 yrs old, Army Veteran from 1989-1993. Married , no kids, 1 dog and I live in Beautiful Naples Florida! I am looking into becoming a professional truck driver. I've been doing extensive research about this profession for over 3 weeks and wish I would have stumbled upon this site much earlier! Thanks for all the great information and I will keep everyone posted on my journey. Failing to prepare is preparing to fail.........John Wooden
Thanks for your service to our country and welcome to the forum. I was lucky enough to visit Naples years ago for an extended stay. You're right... it's beautiful!
Thanks for the welcome! After doing my research and applying with multiple carriers, my decision is to go with CRST. I will start training for my CDL in a few weeks. I've read a lot of posts on this website and I feel like an opportunity is what you make of it. I weighed my options and living where I do the number of carriers willing to hire in my area is very limited for inexperienced drivers, the option to go with CRST seems to fit my situation the best. Since I will have a job upon obtaining my CDL, and I do not have to pay back the tuition once I complete my 8 month contract seems like my best choice. I simply cannot finance my tuition at a CDL School or Community College and risk not getting a job after I complete the school. If my finances were a little better I would probably choose to go a different route, but then again if my finances were good, I probably wouldn't be looking at changing careers at this stage in my life. Either way, I have made my decision and I can live with it, I understand the sacrifices I will have to make along the way with the low pay in the beginning and all the problems that go along with this profession. Since I know ahead of time to expect the unexpected, I feel I am prepared for anything that comes my way. I want to thank everyone that has posted on this site. Sharing your experiences, good or bad, and your knowledge has been a tremendous help! Like my boy John Daly says, TEE IT HIGH AND LET ER FLY!!!!!!!!!
Sounds lke you did a lot of homework, and figured out what you want! Welcome to TTR, you'l get lots of advice here, some is good, some is not, but its all entertaining!
Welcome fellow FL trucker! Im about to take my own CDL exam Monday hopefully. I have my own truck and trailer already so I decided to teach myself as I didnt want to pay the 5-6k for school either. lol. But I hear you on FL not having much opportunity even for an owner operator. Loads are gone as soon as they pop up on load boards in this state. Good luck though! CRST seems like a good company!
