To All The Experienced Drivers

How many miles in a day would you call a good day?

A good day is one in which you accomplished your goals and got to enjoy some peaceful rest before the next day. Trucking is challenging. Set goals for your day, for your week and your month. Work at achieving them while being safe.

If you're productive but unsafe you're a danger to the rest of us. Safety is the most critical aspect of a good day. There are all kinds of trucking jobs, but an OTR driver generally considers a 600 mile day to be pretty good. Sometimes you may push 700 but that's out of the ordinary for most. At 500 miles per day running seven days you've hit 3,500 miles. Not many drivers do that with consistency.

Breaking it down to the math like that tells us 500 miles is a good day. But there's way more to this stuff than basic math formulas. Be productive and safe consistently. That's the definition of a good day on this job.

I completely understand what you're saying Old School, I have 3 goals for every day I wake up. #1) Don't hurt anyone #2) Don't hurt yourself #3) Don't hurt the equipment.

I handle myself in a safe, courteous and professional manner at all times.

I like those three goals!

There are too many variables to give you an answer. My last company had trucks governed at 75 mph. Leaving Idaho, which is 70 mph, into Utah and Wyoming which can be up to 80 mph and Nebraska which is 75 mph, my first two full days out I would average 730 to 760 miles.

The company I am with now have the trucks restricted to 70 mph. I go across Nebraska, Wyoming, Nevada, 250 miles of CA into the Port of Oakland or I go across two lane roads and towns in the panhandle of OK, TX and NM to Tucumcari. Too much summertime traffic, so I don't make any headway. Once I'm on 40 to Lake Havasu City, I run 70 mph. I go into California on 40 to CA-58 at Barstow and come out at Bakersfield. Then I go up I-5 to 580 and 880 into Oakland. Really can't make any time on that route and I do good to do 600 miles in a day.

It really isn't about the miles you can do, like Old School said, it's how safe you do it. As a rookie driver, you won't get the miles like experienced drivers do, that will come in time. Hang in there.

Laura

Detention time at shippers and receivers will have a lot to do with your miles for that day. So will road construction delays and accident backups. Totally unpredictable.

If I’m loaded, fueled up and have 1000 miles ahead of me, I like to get 650 or more the first leg. We are governed at 68 and my best day was 710. All the stars were aligned that day and it may never happen again. During the past month I had a 688 and a 683.

But, to emphasize what Old School pointed out, 450 or 500 SAFELY DRIVEN miles are better than 650 risky ones.

I guess I should be proud of 656.8 safe miles today driven then.

I guess I should be proud of 656.8 safe miles today driven then.

Yes you should! Congratulations!

Ha I’ve been averaging 78km=65m per day doing containers i sit in a yard waiting for a crane to come all day!!!! I hate intermodal vs ltl. I miss going from point to point b to c or d asap. I’m going out west next week so I won’t have to deal with this traffic anymore 🤞

How many miles in a day would you call a good day?

Hi Thomas,

You will find that the more you get into the industry, the more you will ficus less on miles and more on other issues such as safety, on time delivery, clock management, health etc.

In fact, when I talk to people and their mindset is focused on miles I know they're either new or still don't understand what it's about.

As an owner, more miles is viewed as a negative. Miles means more wear and tear on the equipment, and that means more maintenance and more taxes. The only time I look at miles is when I do quarterly ifta taxes and it's a number that I just gloss over.

To me, anyone that pounds out 700, 800 miles to me is insane. To company drivers that may seem like an accomplishment, but to me that almoa t borderline torture.

Anyways, take it for what it's worth. I just wanted to get that off my chest.