A teen leaves a trail of upended pylons while navigating Toyota’s challenging “distraction” course. What does it feel like to slam on your anti-lock brakes? What happens if you drive too fast on a slippery road? How do distractions like loud music affect your driving?
While driver’s education classes teach teens how to operate a vehicle, most of us don’t learn much about emergency driving conditions until we actually face an emergency. But a free advanced driving skills course offered by Toyota gives kids and parents a chance to experience real-world driving situations on a closed course. Participants maneuver through pylons, slam on brakes and speed around corners, all under the supervision of professional drivers.
The Toyota Driving Expectations class includes drive time on three closed courses. The first two put kids behind the wheel so they can experience how an anti-lock braking system works on both dry and wet surfaces and teaches avoidance techniques and the best way to keep eyes on the road. The last test is a challenging “distraction” course. Accompanied by a professional driver, the teen drives the pylon course while calling a friend, sending a text message and opening a water bottle. Organizers say teens are surprised how often they knock down or crush an orange cone.
The Toyota course, which is being offered this weekend in Elmont, N.Y., is unique in that it is free and also requires both parent and teen to take part in the driving experience.
Although I haven’t taken the Toyota course, I did take part in an advanced driving course a few years ago. I was amazed at how much I learned, even after more than 20 years behind the wheel. Brakes, tires and safety features have changed a lot in recent years. When I learned to drive, we were instructed to “pump” our brakes when making a quick stop. New anti-lock brake systems should be slammed down with full force. The first time I did it I was startled by the odd grinding noise it made.
Advanced driving courses are offered around the country and typically involve extensive time driving under simulated conditions on closed courses. The class I attended was by Driving Dynamics, an advanced driving school based in Little Silver, N.J. Another school, MasterDrive, was founded by a father whose daughter was killed by a teenage driver. The cost can range from free, like the four-hour Toyota course, to $400 or more for a few days of instruction.
Although the Toyota course is offered only in New York this weekend, the program will be offered again in multiple cities this fall. Go to www.toyotadrivingexpectations.com to sign up or learn more.
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25 Comments
This is something I and others have been advocating for decades. The so many teenagers drive dangerously is that they don’t know they’re driving dangerously. No one knowingly drives in a way that endangers their life. In an unexpected emergency, response has to be almost instinctive. When my kids were learing to drive, I would take them to an empty, snow-covered parking lot and tell them to weave in and out around the light poles, driving as fast as they could, so they could feel a car go out of control.
— Weird HaroldAdvanced driving courses are great. I took one after I had my car totalled in 1999 by a bunch of drunken louts. It wasn’t my fault, I was stationary at a red light and got rammed, but it shook me up so much I thought I needed to get my confidence back before driving again. And not only did I get that but I got a lot more driving skill besides.
I will be taking the course again before returning to driving after a 5 year car-less hiatus in Manhattan.
The thing that stuck me in the course is how different the steering of individual cars can be. Some are slow and heavy and some are so light they made me nervous. It isn’t just about whether there is power steering but also about the size of the wheel and the power of the engine. Now, if I got into a new car the first thing I’d do is drive slowly round a few corners to gauge how tight the steering is. And yes the brakes as well.
I was also lucky my course was mostly during heavy rain and the instructor refused to cancel. As a result I learned a lot about driving in heavy rain and water-covered roads. I’d been taught to go at a slow steady pace through water when I first got my licence, but at the advanced course we learned that you should really make a gradual acceleration (and you need the safe slow starting speed to do that) through deep water to keep the car from flooding. In the subtropics that is important to know!
— JillyFlowerDriving courses for everyone, every five years, would be appropriate. New technologies and improvements such as antilock braking require different strategies as does the increased road traffic volume. By the way, do not slam your antilock brakes when on ice, you need to use threshold braking to allow you to brake and steer.
— RichLawSimple driving tips include:-
1. both hands on the wheel 9 and 3,
2.looking 12-20 seconds ahead of you and around your vehicle every 6 seconds,
3.stagger your car with the cars next to you
4. always leave sufficient escape room when you approach an intersection (intersections account for 80+% of accidents. This could mean several car lengths until 3 or 4 vehicles or more are behind you, this will reduce your likelihood of being rear ended.
Well, this is long overdue. The same training and skill set has been proposed before, and it always gets rejected on the grounds that it involves driving fast or some such nonsense. It’s the same mindset that rejected seat belts in the 50’s, because “there must be something wrong with the car” if it has belts (Ford introduced belts in the 50’s and promptly lost sales to Chevrolet).
I recall a conversation with a conservative, “safety minded” driver. She recalled driving along Rt 128 (similar to the Beltway) during rush hour in the rain and stated that “the car spun into the guard rail”. Not “I did something that set the car spinning”, but a statement that assumes the car magically takes over control of itself just before an accident. There were thousands of other cars passing over the same spot at the same time, none of which mysteriously ended up in the median. She had no conception that some combination of driver action, the road surface and vehicle maintenance resulted in a skid, but believed just happened by some sort of unknowable magic. She fundamentally does not understand the she has to *drive* the car, not ride in it while holding the wheel.
— RobertClasses that teach how to recover from a skid are the only way to get the right reflexes trained in so they will be ready when needed. It also makes it clear that the driver, not the car, is responsible for keeping the vehicle on the road.
I’m really amazed how few people understand ABS (antilock brakes). I’ve been told that it’s bad for my car to use them by friends, even though it’s advised to use them every so often to keep the fluid from stagnating. They save a lot of lives by granting a few split seconds.
FROM TPP — I have to say, the first time I heard them grind, I was startled and pulled my foot off. I’m glad I had the experience in a safe environment. It made all the difference the first time I had to use them in an emergency situation.
— ChristinaMaking your kids weave in and out of light poles at high speeds in the snow? Last I checked, light poles are made of (best case) metal, or (worst case) concrete. That is so not an empty parking lot. I would probably call the cops and social services if I saw that. There are problems, and there are solutions, and there are “solutions.”
— MattAll comments are great. Hands are better at 10 & 10 as this will allow more room for manouvering in case of emergency i.e skidding when hands may be frozen on the wheel. Stay aware of 360 degrees around you, so check rear view mirror frequently, every 5-15 sec. Keep a safe space cushion around the vehicle. A gap of 4 secs. behind the next car will be quite safe and do not drive in someone’s blind spot.Check blind spot before any sideway movement or turning.
— shafqaiserThis sort of thing should be mandatory for kids to get their licenses, especially with the more recent studies showing that they engage in dangerous driving behaviors (phoning, speeding, texting, eating, etc) even though they overestimate the dangers of those behaviors. At least this way, they’ll know how to adjust when they come up too quickly on a sharp curve.
— ChristinaGood ones, Rich. The 9-3 is not always ideal, especially if you need to shift a lot and/or want to avoid fatigue.
Expanding on your point #2, adjust your reactions to the cars WELL IN FRONT of the car(s) ahead of you, and keep extra distance in front of you to compensate for the tailgater behind you. Then, in emergency stops, take the space back as necessary.
#4 is a great point.
I’ll add #5: At stops, leave enough space in front to escape by moving forward to the side without the delay of backing up, and watch behind and around you (ambulances, daydreamers…). You might be stopped, but it is a live environment and you are still driving.
and #6: When waiting for oncoming traffic to clear for a left turn, keep the front wheels straight (don’t start turning until ready to move). This prevents you from being pushed into oncoming traffic if rear-ended.
…and there are others I can’t think of now…
Also, when you switch cars, do a mental checklist. Don’t put yourself in a position where you have to fumble. Know whether you have ABS before you need to brake hard.
— BillHelpful tips for driving in Florida:
— KatieDo not eat tacos while driving.
Do not speed in the rain.
Do not drive into puddles you can’t see the bottom of.
Do not assume anyone on the road knows the rules of the road or will ever give you right of way.
I don’t disagree with better pre-licence training at all. BUT there is a big difference between the skills we can teach brand new drivers and those we can teach after you’ve been on the road a few years. New drivers will always be inexperienced. They need to learn extra caution. Once we’ve been driving 10+ years we need to re-learn caution sure, but face the fact we’ll have more experience than the novices and need to have the skills to deal with harder situations better than we could hve done when we first started out.
It’s by making sure that novices are well trained (for novices) and experienced drivers are good experienced drivers that we’ll ensure better road safety.
I don’t know the rule in the US (I suspect it is ridiculously state-by-state) but back home you have a probationary iicense for 3 years. You have half the demerit points to lose before you lose your licence and a zero bood alcohol requirement. Perhaps we should have that here in the US, and also (in both places) require advanced training before granting the open licence?
— JillyFlowerI think courses like this are a great idea.
I live in Sunny Austin Texas, home of water-soluble driving skills. Seriously, when the water hits the road, they lose their little minds down here. Moved here three years ago from Kansas, and am still amazed when I head out on a lightly rainy day to see one driver creeping along the highway, white-knuckled at 30 mph, while the SUVs fly by him, drivers on cell phones at 75 mph.
Ice is even worse. We get a quarter-inch of ice here and it shuts down the town, literally. I watch the other drivers spin across the highway, bounce off into the median, careen out of control, and play bumper cars with one another, and I just stay home, sip my cocoa (because it’s 35 degrees and that’s fireplace-and-cocoa weather!), and avoid them. I learned to drive in Mid-Missouri and Eastern Kansas weather, and there’s pretty much no weather I can’t handle (even if handling it means, “Don’t go out in that! Are you INSANE?”)
It’d be great if the drivers here could get even the most basic training on how to react to rain, pull out of a skid, tell when you’re hydroplaning, or tell if it’s safe to drive into a puddle (quick tip: if it’s flowing and you can’t tell how deep it is, STOP AND GO AROUND!).
Robert, don’t be so hard on your friend. Sometimes a car can skid through nothing the driver does. I’ve been in the passenger seat when the driver hit a stretch of black ice with the left wheels and not with the right. We were going 20 below the posted limit, she was paying attention, and we literally couldn’t see the ice. Black ice is like that. The car popped into a skid, but unlike your friend my friend had been taught how to pull out of a skid, kept her head, and kept the car on the road (barely). If there’d been other cars nearby or a guardrail it might have been different, but everyone was keeping their distance pretty well from each other. A car can skid even if a driver’s doing everything right; the important part is knowing what to do next and above all keeping your cool. I hope this course stresses that.
— RowanI agree with all of the comments. Youngsters and most of us were never taught to drive properly, nor is it a requirement to know how to do anything other than “AIM” a vehicle in order to get a drivers license. No knowledge of mechanics, tyres, etc. The other thing that the US needs to do is to pass laws that make it illegal to use a hand held cell phone, drink anything, or eat sandwiches and do your make up while driving.
The other thing that would greatly reduce accidents is to make it a multiple point violation to passing on the right. (Even on multiple lane superhighways) If you need to pass, move one lane at a time and then only move when you have done your 360 degree check
Bob
— Monaco DriverI have been driving a car for over 50 years and have yet to have an accident. I would sign up for one of these courses in a heartbeat. It is never too late to learn new skills, and it is never too early to have a refresher course in how to drive safely.
— anonmAustin drivers may have poor driving habits in the rain and rare ice storm but here in New England every winter drivers seem to need to relearn how to drive on snow and ice. Apparently a few days of nice weather melts that part of their brains.
Perhaps all of us should be required to take an advanced driver ed course every 10 years as a condition of license renewal - regardless of our chronological age.
As a driver of about a dozen years, and having a brother who just got his license, I think making kids learn and drive for their first few years on a slow vehicle with manual transmission is best. It forces the driver to be more engaged and use both hands primarily for driving. In big cities during rush hours, you really can’t do the distracting things like eat or text on your phone, because you’re too busy shifting.
— MattI took driver’s education in school (in the 1980’s), and we had some of this kind of training in our course. I’m amazed that driver’s ed is no longer offered in most schools - the private classes I’ve seen don’t come near to the time and instruction I got, which was taught 5 days a week for 5 months, plus four weeks of road driving after school. The tests I had to pass for my school course were much more extensive than the quick driving test I took at the DMV. Considering we all have to interact with other drivers on the road, I’m frustrated that driver’s education isn’t taken all that seriously.
— KarenLiving now in Seattle (with frequent rain) and having lived previously in Atlanta, let me suggest Austin’s drivers may be on the mark. After long periods with no rain, roads accumulate oil and dirt that can become treacherous right after a rain. Here, where it rains frequently, these oils never accumulate.
Three cheers for weaving through light poles after snow storms. As a teenager in Ohio, we always had one hand on the handbrake, swapping ends and sliding into parking spaces in a full opposite-lock skid.
Let me recommend one of the advanced performance driving schools (I’ve done a couple Skip Barber courses) for adults. It’s there that you learn the physics of driving, not just the rules.
— SamRe: Matt
Why don’t you learn how to drive first?
(hint: Positional Awareness)
Oh, wait, just like a typical American driver performance:pathetic. Do you ever see any American F1 drivers? Don’t hold your breath…
Beside driving private jet/rotorcraft, I also taught flying and learned more by teaching than by performing the task.
Not to mention why all General aviation pilots go through a bi-annual, while on the air carrier/freight/charter sectors the training procedures range from 6-12 month cycles. One never stops learning…unless one stops flying!
Of course if one never learns in the first place…
Now what was the question?
Note: I taught a girlfriend how to drive forwards AND backwards around a maze of lightpoles w/in a parking lot (not to mention spins/skids/high speed manuevers).
When she (quickly) passed her driver’s license test (she was from Russia and never had driven a car), the tester asked “Who taught you to drive this well?”
When I have a child, I won’t teach him/her. They will go to a performance driving school that has a teenage driving program for newly licensed drivers. Cheap insurance to provide for my child to survive in landscape populated by idiots driving w/no comprehension of vehicle dynamics in potentially lethal situations.
As always, your mileage may vary……
— Space CowboyI think it is a great idea to have driving “refresher” courses. Perhaps every 5-10 years? There should at least be ONE retest at some point. I see so many people make really dangerous mistakes, like passing on the right. My current annoyance is people who don’t know where to place their car when turning left from a break in a median-divided road. So many hug the median closest to their car rather than pulling forward toward the median in front of them. If a car coming from the other direction wants to turn, then neither car can see and the likelihood of an accident increases.
— driving schoolHow much emphasis here is placed on the rule “don’t enter the intersection unless you can clear it”?
This morning I saw a terrible tragedy barely averted yet again. Two cars tried to cross West and were left sticking rear-end half out into the intersection. As a cars on the north south road were honking and dodging trying to get through on their green lights - one of the obstructive cars tried to lurch forward (as space was gradually opening up). It nearly hit a woman pushing a stroller with another baby in a sling!
The obstructive car should never have been there in the first place. And once there should have faced the possibility of being rammed in the rear end rather than endanger pedestrians who were forced to weave around to cross on their walk sign.
It was one of the first rules I learned as a new driver. In fact I think how to stay out of dangerous situations is much more important than learning how to deal with them once you’re in. Both need to be done but surely avoidance is the better plan, especially for the inexperienced.
— JillyFlowerMy then 15 year old daughter to Master Drive and it was a very good experience from learning law and driving logic to the distractions training and the basic on-the-road driving that included residential neighborhoods as well as freeways. I’m a lot less reluctant to let her borrow our cars now that she has her license.
— Michael in DenverHow can a class like this simulate the experience of of driving over the Williamsburg bridge, which has the narrowest lanes imaginable, plus girders that narrow them even more at points, and some guy with road rage is tailgating you and there’s no room to go forward or into the slower lane? Oh, and your friends are joking around in the passenger seats?
How can a class teach you that there are cabbies that play chicken, nosing their way in front of you, again on city streets with trucks parked, ambulances or fire trucks shrieking behind you, and loud music playing on your radio?
— KatrinaRowan, that first light rain after it hasn’t rained for awhile brings the oil to the surface of the pavement and it’s slick as glass. That’s why we slow down, and I’m tired of being carped at for doing it.
— JLI took the Driving Dynamics course about 4 years ago. Lots of great pointers–the two best things were learning about the positioning of my side mirrors (which was different from what I was taught and saved me from an accident) and driving their “controlled skid” car. I agree with others– courses like these should be taken every few years, even by experienced drivers.
FROM TPP — Yes, I drove the skid car too. Pretty cool, and the whole experience had a huge impact on the way I drive.
— VSThe website that you refer us to has not been updated with a schedule for other cities. I tried calling the phone number in the “contact us” link, but it is not a working number.
— ChavesFROM TPP — I don’t think it’s going to be updated until the fall, so you should check back.