Swift training school any one out here been there.

I never leave home without my laptop! I brought it to school in Lewiston and I have it with me now in Sumner. It will go with me on the road in a mentors truck, and in my own truck when I get it.
I use my cell phone, blackberry, and tether it to my laptop for internet access.

Needless to say, I am very much into my tech gadgets!

As for lugging my laptop everywhere, it stays in my bag in the hotel. I have stayed in a lot of hotels in my day, and never had a problem yet. The key is to keep everything neatly packed in my bag, with the back zipped shut.

 

I finally received a call from my mentor this afternoon. He will be in Sumner in the morning so we will be meeting at the terminal around 9am!

I will try and keep some updates coming while I am out with the mentor of the next few weeks.

 

Now the true fun really starts for ya !! Least it wasn't too bad.. Orientation on Tues and headin out with the mentor on Friday...

 

Today was the day that I got to meet my mentor!!!! His name is Oleg and he runs Heavy Haul out of the Sumner yard. I am not really interested in going with Heavy Haul, but he is a really nice guy and I think we will do well together for the next 6 weeks.

We met at the terminal in Sumner this morning. He was returning to pick up a load from the Costco DC, next door to the Sumner yard, that was going to the Costco on Division Street in Spokane. So first off when we met in the terminal he showed me how to scan all of the documents from the load that he just dropped off at the Costco DC from Portland. I only know the guy 2 minutes and he's already teaching me something!

We retrieve the tractor from the tire shop where they replaced a tire on the stab axle. Oh yeah, this is a 2008 FL Columbia with 4 axles and a 13 speed transmission. Nothing I have ever driven before, but that is coming soon. So we get in the tractor and I throw all my gear in the bunk. We hook up to the trailer that he already picked up from the costco DC on the way to get me. This is a dry van also with 4 axles, one of which is a stab. The trailer weighed in at 59,229 which is a little bit more than the 15,000 that I trained with.

Oleg introduced me to his DM and we got out of the terminal on the way to Spokane. Oleg drove and I sat with my eagles eye on his every move. We had some time to #### chat a little bit as he took us over Hwy 18 to I90. We fueled up at the Pilot in Ellensburg, exit 106. Again I watched very closely as he showed me the proper procedures to fuel up, get a reciept, take a leak, (I already knew how to do that of course), and get back on the road towards Spokane. Again Oleg drove until we got to the rest stop just west of Moses Lake where we switched and I drove for a while.

I got behind the wheel and got comfortable before I started out. Took off from the rest stop and got out on I90. Since I am just starting out, I avoided using the 5-7 high gears and just used 8 high to cruise. Got the hang of downshifting and upshifting from high to low on the small hills, and had no problem shifting after I initially got started. I must say, I was a little rusty after 2 weeks of not being in a truck and only having a small amount of practice in school. All in all I did very well and Oleg seemed to be somewhat relaxed in the jump seat as I drove.

We switched back over at the sprague Lake rest stop so that he could take us into town and get us to Costco in time for our 8pm appointment. We arrived at 7:35 and had to track down someone to recieve the load. We already had a preplan for a pallett trailer from Costco, but the trailer was not full so we parked the tractor in the lot where I will spend my first night in the sleeper! Oleg only lives a few blocks away from Costco, so he will return in the morning, we will hook up to the pallett trailer, and move the rig to a truck stop where I will stay till Monday morning.

This works out great for me because I get the time on the truck and I also get paid while I am here. Monday at 7am we will head back west to sumner where we will get another load, probably headed to the Portland area.

As I said in the begining of this post, Oleg is a very nice guy and he keeps his truck immaculate. I know we will be able to get along just fine. He even gave me the bottom bunk and said that I am clean enogh where he would remove the plastic bag from the mattress. I really do not want to run Heavy Haull, but this way I will learn something that others may not. At the end of our 6 weeks I can go out and run the 48.

Again I hope to be able to post updates while I am on the road, so stay tuned!

 

Sounds like a fun start.. least the mentor is letting see first hand what its like to stay alone in lala land in the truck LOL !!!

For the being rusty on the shifting... That is actually because the different engine/tranmission configuration tend to have a little bit different timing.. Especially going froma 9 to a 13 speed..

Have fun and try and keep everyone posted !! Drive safe.

 

Good stuff there Ford.

I am jealous.

I was not able to make my June 1 training, so decided to stick it out one more year at my current job (school bus driver).

Please keep us up to date!

 

Ford,How you doing out there on the road?

 

So what do these trainers or "mentors" get out of this?

I sure as hell wouldn't let a rookie pilot my Rig while I sat in the monkey seat staring at the scenery going by. Is he getting all your CPM or something?

 

Ya, at Swift all miles are paid to the mentor. The trainee gets paid a salary per week, don't remember exactly what is was. Also, the mentor get 1CPM for every mile the trainee drives for 1 year after he/she gets off the mentor's truck. Can really add up. I know there were company driver/mentors with swift making upwards of 90 grand a year.

 

This has changed a little bit. The student gets paid a weekly salary of $450 for weeks 1-4 and $500 for weeks 5 & 6. The mentor gets his cpm rate for ALL miles that the truck is run. When Swift cut the cpm by $.01, they also cut off a lot of other benefits. The mentor no longer gets the $.01 cpm from the students miles after he leaves the truck.

So the only benefit a mentor is getting is more miles when he has a student onboard. This is why so many of them are trying to run the truck as a team right from the start!