This afternoon I’ve had the pleasure of leaving work early to have some fun with all my colleagues at Forest & Fields. What we would be doing this afternoon was kind of a surprise, but some bright souls figured it out what we were going to do yesterday; this afternoon we had a traffic safety course in Moordrecht (in Dutch: slipcursus! (msg me when you can come up with a better translation in English ;P)).
We had a great time: first off, we had a lesson in theory for about half an hour. They’ve made it clear that they do not teach you all you should be thought during driving lessons. Things you need to know when you need to make an emergency stop with your car. How you can get your car back in control after loosing control and such. Things they didn’t teach me (and most of my colleagues) during my (our) driving lessons.
Ten past two!
During driving lessons, I’ve been told to put my hands in the so called “Ten past two-position”. Today I gained some additional information as to where (and especially where NOT!) to put my hands when driving. New cars all are equipped with Air Bags, which tend to explode (with an average speed of 320 kilometres / hour!) in your face when you hit something while driving. Do not put your thumbs between your steering wheel and your Air Bag, you might loose your thumbs (actually happened several times! (don’t worry, still got all ten of my fingers)). So ‘Ten past two’ is great, but pay attention to the position of your thumbs: place them on top of the steering wheel, not within the ‘holes’.
During theory, three exercises were discussed: emergency braking, emergency braking in combination with evading and ofcourse: slipstream training 
(or whatever the hell you would call that in English ;)). Although theory was interesting I found the main event quite a bit more interesting: doing these tests yourself.
The excitemen…urh, exercises
After we’d discussed the theory needed for the actual happening, we were off. We were divided into small groups to enter the six Mitsubishi’s which were waiting for us ‘to challenge them’. During the exercises we’ve killed quite a bunch of virtual school kids..it was a bit disappointing really :P.
The emergency brake was quite simple, although the instructor had to tell us that we needed to put the car to a complete stop. All three of us had the (stupid) habit of letting go of the brake when the car almost finished its brake-course. The idea of an emergency stop is, ofcourse, is to stop…
The second exercise was trying to evade a bunch of school kids on a slippery road. We needed to come in on a speed of 30 km/h after which the instructor yelled ‘LEFT!’ of ‘RIGHT!’. The challenge was to first lose enough speed after which you could spent time (milliseconds) to evade the happy bunch of virtual school kids (either to the left or right side, according to the hint the instructor just gave you). We all had five tries and found it quite difficult. The trick was to first hit the brake as hard as you could, after you could let go of the brake. After that: evade! Sounds quite easy, but it’s very difficult to get a hold of your vehicle after braking heavily.
The last exercise was meant to teach us how to get control on a slippery road (this time, without the virtual school kids). This time, we need to come in on the same speed, had to steer right a bit after which the instructor pulled the emergency brake (handbrake?). On a slippery road, the back of your call is thrown forward and it was our job to get the vehicle straight on the road again.
My first try was awful, as I forgot to hit the ’shift pedal’ which was needed. The second try went wrong because I steered in to roughly. I did good on the last three tries ^_^.
ABS - May the force be with you
We’ve learned a great deal about ABS (Anti Blocking System / Anti Blokkeer Systeem) that’s installed in most (if not all) new cars. This nifty gadget can be very handy, but it’s good to learn how you can actually yield it to your advantage, because it could be fatal if not used wisely(!).
Any of you guys ever done such a training course?
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#1 by Mattijs - May 30th, 2008 at 07:02
Sounds very cool. But we want pictures to prove it
#2 by Robert - May 30th, 2008 at 14:02
Sounds cool indeed. Never done it myself, although it was included in my driver’s license “package”.