In surveys on attitudes towards driving, two findings are consistently shown:
b) Most people are critical of everyone else's driving
I've always been fascinated by the interaction between these two findings. With each group holding more than 95% of those people surveyed and with it being so, so common to hear people openly expressing those opinions, I totally accept that they reflect the attitudes of the general driving population, yet they are in direct conflict with one another!
If we're ALL really good at driving, then how can we ALL be so bad at it at the same time?
Quite clearly, there is a significant number of people driving who genuinely THINK that they're really good at driving and therefore wouldn't approach a Driving Instructor to help them to improve, but attract a lot of criticism from other drivers around them.
Now I don't know who those people are, and neither does any observer - these people can only identify themselves in their own private thoughts.
The first step is to accept something very difficult and that is that whilst it's true that there are one or two really angry people in the world who are just angry at everything, you are probably doing something to attract any criticism you receive.
You have to remember that at that moment in time when another driver is blasting the horn and calling you an idiot, all they are basing that opinion on is what they've just seen you do. They don't know you. They don't know that you drive for a living. They don't know that you've been driving for years without a crash and they don't know that you've got a clean licence. All they know is that you perhaps changed lanes without apparently knowing they were there and almost caused a crash so in their opinion, for that moment alone, you showed them that you were a bad driver... and as hard as it is to accept, they're right - although it might be a rare occurrence, at that moment that was exactly what you were!
We all make mistakes (including me), but for the best of us it's a very rare situation that might only happen once every couple of years rather than every time they leave the house. As we're all surrounded by the same random selection of drivers and driving on the same random selection of roads, it's a fairly accurate way of judging how good you are at driving - the less often you find yourself in situations like that, the better at driving you are (and you could apply the same mentality to your application of the rules such as speed limits, traffic lights and parking etc).
One time efficient and flexible way of improving your skills is to read a book on the subject and this is my essential reading list for anyone who is interested:
- The Highway Code - start with this one of course! Most of the problems arise where people who haven't read this book since their driving test took place years ago either come across others who know it well or have simply forgotten what it says - simply brushing up on the rules is THE single, most time effective way of reducing your road risk!
- The DVSA Guide to Driving, The Essential Skills - if the Highway Code is the rule book, The Essential Skills is a manual of how to apply those rules to best affect and the two go hand in hand. These two books are the ones on which the Theory Test questions are based.
- Roadcraft, The Police Driver's Handbook - often seen by those who haven't read it properly as being "totally different to how you drive for your driving test", this book goes into detail about road risk rather than focusing on the correct application of rules. Particular focus is placed on making sure the driver is mentally fit for the task of driving, reading the road ahead and controlling the car.
- Mind Driving: New Skills For Staying Alive On The Road (Stephen Haley) - is an excellent examination of the reasons why drivers crash and what is going through their heads when they do so. It's a very different book to Roadcraft. From discussing the biological problems such as natural blind-spots in the human eye and the way in which the brain processes information from the eyes, this book aims to help you identify risk in your driving and put in place strategies for avoiding or reducing that risk.
With the exception of Mind Driving, all of these books are all freely available in your usual outlets. Mind Driving was published in 2006 and as such, it's becoming more difficult to find a brand new edition, but I did notice that there are new copies available on Amazon when I was writing this.
If, after reading these books, you feel that you would benefit from some time with a qualified trainer, then I can obviously help with that and it's worth bearing in mind that we do these training sessions without L plates and that the branding on the car is deliberately low key to avoid attracting undue levels of attention. We usually meet, start and finish at local car parks to keep things as discrete as we can be and with these sessions involving full licence holders, they are very much "training sessions" looking at the areas of weakness that the driver wants to look at, rather than "driving lessons" which are aimed at helping a driver to pass a driving test.
When lock-down is over, get in touch if you think we can help!
Nick Heath Driver Training is located in Rode Heath on the Staffordshire / Cheshire border and provides driving training services to those looking to either improve their driving or learn from scratch. In addition to media work, we conduct Taxi Driver Assessments for local authorities and offer Advanced Driver Training and Testing, Motorway Training and Fuel Efficient Driver Training alongside refresher courses and learner driving lessons. We are ORDIT registered to provide Driving Instructor Training and are listed on the DVSA's register of Fleet Trainers so we can help you with your business needs.
More details are available on our website www.nickheathdrivertraining.org.uk
