Profile For 22Younggun

UPDATE: As of 10/9, I passed my cdl test on the third try with only 2 points being deducted. Since then, I have driven 1 week with a finisher at CFI before I had to come home for a family emergency.

I do not know if I am going to be able to go back on the road for two weeks to finish my training.

Looking for a job where I can be home daily.

Thank you to everyone for the positive messages.

I started my truck driving training at Crowder College in Neosho, MO on September 6 for CFI. There were 7 of us going through it. We were a day behind due to the Labor Day holiday. One of the guys in my class seemed like he did not know how to drive at all. So the instructors had to spend extra time with him and this did not allow us to get ample time behind the wheel doing the maneuvers we needed to do. After a week and a half, they finally released the guy and then things ramped up. As of this message, I am still at Crowder College.

I have taken my skills test twice, and both times I had an auditor with me the examiner. I have been told that the auditor was only there to rate the examiner and not the student. I quickly found out that this was not the case. On my last test was on a Thursday, and the auditor graded me as well as the examiner and said that I ran out of points doing a parallel park after I got the truck in the box. The examiner said that he did not have that many points for me, but since the auditor called it, we had to go with his grade. This caused me to fail the test and wait over the weekend to retake it.

Other than the auditor, the instructors at Crowder College are very knowledgeable and helpful. They want to see you succeed! However, pass or fail on Monday, my time at Crowder is done.

I started my truck driving training at Crowder College in Neosho, MO on September 6 for CFI. There were 7 of us going through it. We were a day behind due to the Labor Day holiday. One of the guys in my class seemed like he did not know how to drive at all. So the instructors had to spend extra time with him and this did not allow us to get ample time behind the wheel doing the maneuvers we needed to do. After a week and a half, they finally released the guy and then things ramped up. As of this message, I am still at Crowder College.

I have taken my skills test twice, and both times I had an auditor with me the examiner. I have been told that the auditor was only there to rate the examiner and not the student. I quickly found out that this was not the case. On my last test was on a Thursday, and the auditor graded me as well as the examiner and said that I ran out of points doing a parallel park after I got the truck in the box. The examiner said that he did not have that many points for me, but since the auditor called it, we had to go with his grade. This caused me to fail the test and wait over the weekend to retake it.

Other than the auditor, the instructors at Crowder College are very knowledgeable and helpful. They want to see you succeed! However, pass or fail on Monday, my time at Crowder is done.

I was originally going to go with SWIFT. However, after being told that I can do the training in my home state of Oklahoma and stay at my house, I found out that I would still have to pay back the cost of a hotel room as well as the training that will becoming out of my check weekly for the first year.

I decided to join CFI, and I am currently in Neosho, MO about to take my skills test in 2 days.

Good luck!

23 August 2022 Today during my lunch break I got a call from Mayra, my assigned recruiter at Swift Driver Academy here in Phoenix. She asked me a bunch of questions to see if I prequalify for eligibility to enroll in the school (“Have you ever used illegal drugs” threw me for a bit of a loop). After hearing my answers she said I did qualify, and she invited me to come to the Phoenix terminal on Friday for a tour and an interview. I’m off early on Friday at my current job in Phoenix, so getting there by 4 will be easy. I’m smiling. It’s exciting to feel excited.

I’ve been thinking about taking truck driver training for several years, and in recent days I filled out the info on the Swift website to get more info on their training program. It’s time for me to take a deeper look at what my life could be like if I were to become a truck driver. I have Trucker's Truth to thank for helping me do an enormous amount of research before I decided to apply for training. I'm going to try to write a diary of my experiences to help inform others who find this site after I did.

I’ve read many Trucker's Truth posts and watched dozens of YouTube videos posted by drivers in their first year on the job. Big concerns seem to be equipment breakdowns that keep drivers off the road (thus not making money), and not enough “home time,” or days off near where they live. I noticed Swift now guarantees new hires will make $1,0000.00 (one thousand dollars) weekly after they get off their mentor’s truck ($800 a week while on the mentor’s truck), so that addresses the equipment issue for the first six or seven months of the gig. There is no payment during the four week training, and I am OK with that. As far as home time goes, I don’t technically have a home, or live with or near my family, so it’s not an issue for me. I’ve just been renting rooms in houses for years, usually with friends. If I can take my Phoenix Terminal “home time” in Oregon, Idaho, New Mexico, Colorado, or Virginia, that would give me time off near family. So I’d kinda rather stay on the road. Not much holding me here in Phoenix.

I’ve lived all over the Western United States (Idaho, Utah, California, Washington, New Mexico and Arizona) and traveled in about as many Western states I’ve lived (Nevada, Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and I’ll include Oklahoma and Texas). I’ve owned homes in California and Washington state, but I’ve not had interest lately in putting down roots, and even less ability to pay for anything of the sort. But if I could swing it, if I could cobble together some cash and get my own place on a little bit of land, I have a pretty good idea where I’d like to do it. El Paso, Texas. It’s like Mexico but it’s not in Mexico, and I love Mexico. I love the culture, I love the food and I love the language. I speak fluent Spanish, having learned it as a missionary back in the late 1980s.

It feels a little odd to have a dream again, a goal maybe. I’ve become such a minimalist in midlife that owning things holds very little value for me. I value experiences. I value adventure, and I don’t mean planned ones, I mean when things don’t work out, how do you work them out? Challenges maybe. The more I read about trucking, and the more videos I see about it, the more I think it may be the right fit for my wandering soul always in search of adventures that challenge my intelligence and my patience. Lots of other people are doing this work safely and efficiently every day. There’s no reason to think I can’t as well. I’m ready to give it a try.

I think Over The Road sounds like the kind of challenge I would love. Big trip, be disciplined about my schedule, and get it done a little bit early. Five hundred miles a day does not bother me. Back in March I drove backroads from San Antonio to El Paso in a day and had the time of my life. Windmills, oil rigs and two-lane blacktop for hours on end.

I’m interested in team driving if that is an option for newbies and it sounds like it may be. Teams can be on the road even longer than solo drivers, so they can get really long trips, like 2,000 miles each way. I like the road warrior lifestyle. “We’ve got a long way to go and a short time to get there” are lyrics to "Eastbound and Down," a song I used to sing along with on the radio when I was in elementary school and Smokey and the Bandit was in theaters. Being four states away by morning holds a certain appeal for me. But finding a good partner for team driving must be a real trick. How do you choose a person you can be cooped up with for three weeks at a time? What if their farts are horrible? What if they are lazy? Or worst of all, what if they don’t know the difference between “there” and “their?”

I have been a supervisor in the transportation industry for about 4 years. I was working at a LTL company, and it did not feel right. So, I quit my job and tried early retirement. I hate being at home and nowhere to go. After talking with my wife, I decided to pursue a career as a truck driver. I want to be supervisor and doing this will allow me to see what the drivers go through out on the road. I feel that it will make me a better supervisor when I come off the road.

I was looking at companies the provide training and will help new drivers obtain their cdl. I had it narrowed down between three companies. Roehl Transport, Wilson Logistics, and Swift. After reviewing all the companies and using trucking truth, I decided to go with Swift. I went through the hiring process, drug testing and everything they asked. I decided to pursue the CDL(P) on my own. I was scheduled to start the school this past Monday. Then, I found out, from the doctor that did my DOT physical, about the charges that the recruiter did not tell me about.

I asked the recruiter if this will be deducted from my paycheck. He said that I would be charged $50 per paycheck for the first year for the class alone. I would be deducted the cost of the hotel room as well and that would be paid off in six months. The problem with this, I was not going to stay in a hotel. The training class is 10 minutes from my house and I was told I could stay at home during the first three weeks.

After talking to a friend of mine, I found out that he drives for CFI and is a trainer. He told me that CFI offers people with no experience a chance to drive for them. So, I talked to a recruiter on Tuesday, and sure enough, they do offer training classes at 2 different places in Missouri.

I told him that I was interested and he asked me the questions that they all ask about my past driving record, any drug use, and job history. He scheduled my drug and hair test yesterday, which I have already completed, and I am waiting to hear when I start.

CFI gives you the option of going to Springfield, MO or Neosho, MO for training.

The only thing you have to do is 1 year commitment and you will not have to pay back anything.

I will keep you posted.