Profile For Daniel A.

I took my tests today. The pretrip went very well, I got 100% on it. I made a few mistakes on my backing but still passed. I was most nervous about the driving test. Unfortunately, I didn't get as much driving time during class as I probably should have had, so I wasn't at all confident in my abilities. I'm still struggling with downshifting.

I hit a curb early in the test, so I will be receiving more driving time at the school before I test again.

After two weeks of class work at Southwest Truck Driver Training in Tucson (with some practice moving tandems, and coupling and uncoupling), today we practiced shifting on some frontage roads just out of town. I was pretty nervous. It's been a many years since I drove a manual 4 wheeler, and even then I was self-taught and didn't do it for long, so I was concerned that I was going to perform poorly today. Starting out I was shifting pretty poorly, but I improved, and it helped that my instructor was very calm through the whole thing. All-in-all I'm still not very good at it, but I did notice significant improvement through the day.

Tomorrow I should get to record the pretrip, and I've received permission to post it on YouTube for the class to use as a study aid.

Hi, I've been lurking on the site for a couple months, taking advantage of all the info and advice, and using the training materials (which were a huge boost to getting my permit).

I started school on August 17th at Southwest Truck Driver Training in Tucson (it's been a good experience). As per the advice I found here, it was my intention to acquire pre-hire letters before class, but unfortunately I was repairing my AC during the time I had originally booked for it. I've been so busy studying for class that the applications were pushed to this week. I've already filled out a few, and received a single pre-hire, but I'm in the process of filling out more to further my options.

Now, the gist of my question. I have seen on a couple of the carrier's websites that they offer tuition reimbursement, but only with a contract to work for them for so many miles (75,000 on one site, and 150,000 on another). How many miles is it reasonable for me to expect to drive in the first year? A low end estimate would probably be more helpful than a high end. I'm trying to gauge how long the contracts would be for.

Thanks in advance.