Employ these 10 tips to be successful on your road test...first time!
Top 10 Ways to Pass a Road Test
Overview1) Practice driving as much as you can in the months leading up to your road test. Practice in different vehicles with different mentors; 2) Slow speed maneuvers will teach you mastery of the primary controls and where your vehicle is in space and place; 3) Parallel park teach you about the blind areas around your vehicle; 4) Backing teaches you control; 5) Parking teaches you where your vehicle is in relation to other traffic; 6) Shoulder check is a must. Both to pass a road test and drive safely. 7) Do a mock test (practice driving test) with a local driving instructor to learn the test route and what skills and abilities you need to improve before road test day. 8) Before the road test, do a pre-trip inspection of the vehicle. Don't be denied your road test because you have a brake light out. 9) Paperwork - make sure you have the right paperwork and money when you check in for your road test. 10) Finally, poop, breathe, visualize! Go to the toilet, breathe, and visualize yourself being successful. |
Introduction
Top 10 things that you need to do to be successful on a road test.
For the purposes of a road test must demonstrate to the examiner that you have due care and control of the vehicle at all times.
Underpinning due care and control of the vehicle at all times is speed and space management.
You must have control of the speed of the vehicle appropriate to the environment and the traffic in which you're in.
And you must have space management: you must not get too close to other fixed objects or other vehicles on the road.
Be right back to tell you what those top 10 ways to be successful ways to be successful on your road tests are.
Tip #1 :: Practice, Practice, Practice
The number one way to pass your road test and be successful is practice.
Practice, practice, practice! The more practice you get driving the vehicle that you are going to road tests on--whether it's a bus, truck, or car, or a motorcycle--practice.
Get as much driving time as you can.
Driving a vehicle is NOT a spectator sport. You can't watch somebody else do it and learn how to drive.
You have to get behind the wheel, you have to get comfortable with the primary controls of the vehicle, and you have to develop a hazard perception catalogue, a catalogue of different scenarios that come together in any combination of the six driving task criteria--and you can see that in another video--that can get you into danger.
So practice practice, practice!
Tip #2 :: Slow Speed Manoeuvres
The second way to be successful on your road test is slow speed manoeuvres.
Go out to a parking lot, set up some cones, do some forward figure eights, back around corners, reverse figure eights, into stall parks, drive in tight laneways.
Anything that you can do that will help you to do slow-speed maneuvers.
The ability to control the vehicle at a slow speed in a tight space - all of those skills that you learn to do that are transferable and will make your overall driving better.
Practice slow-speed maneuvers.
Tip #3 :: Parallel Park
The third way: parallel park. Ohhhhhh.....The dreaded parallel park.
Everybody hates the parallel park.
It is the most difficult slow-speed maneuver that you have to conduct on a road test for a class 5 or a G1 license.
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Parallel parking, if you don't know how to do it and you don't get clear instruction from your parents or other people who are helping you and your family, go to a driving school, get professional help and they will help you to parallel park.
Now, when you're practicing in a neighborhood in your parallel parking off a car, do it two times and then move on and find another vehicle.
But you have to be able to parallel park, regardless of the fact that we know as traffic authorities that seventy percent of drivers will never parallel park again.
But it is the key to you as a new driver demonstrating to the examiner and the authorities that you have due care and control of the vehicle.
Practice parallel parking.
#4 :: Back Up (Reversing)
The fourth way to be successful on your road test. Back up as much as possible.
Begin backing up in straight lines, then back around corners.
One of the things you're going to have to do is do a two-point reverse turn.
So you're gonna have to pull past the driveway or a laneway or a parking space and you're gonna have to back around the corner and then reverse in the opposite direction.
So back into the laneway and then drive forward and pull out again.
Backing, the more backing you can do the more comfortable you become the vehicle and the primary controls: the steering wheel, the throttle, the brake.
Back up! And when you get really comfortable with backing, go out to the parking lot, set up your cones and do reverse figure eights - reverse figure eights.
When you think you've got it all figured out and you can master those, then you're probably ready for your road test.
Tip #5 :: Parking
The other way to get better at driving is parking.
Parking in mall parking lots or any congested parking lot is a good way to learn more about the vehicle.
You see lots of people backing out of a parking space in a mall parking lot and they get into a tight corner, or the fronts just gonna miss, and you see them in the car and the car sucks in.
No, the car doesn't have the suck-in feature where it gets smaller.
Actually what happens is, as they get into a tight space they slow down and the slower any vehicle goes, the sharper it turns.
So keep that in mind when you're parking, you're backing up, or you're doing any other slow-speed maneuvers.
The slower you go, the sharper the vehicle turns.
Tip #6 :: Shoulder Checking
So the sixth way to be successful on your road test is shoulder checking.
I cannot stress this enough: you must shoulder check!
You cannot do too much shoulder checking, but if you do too little you're not going to be successful.
So every time you make a lateral movement, shoulder check; every time you make a turn shoulder check as you're coming up to the turn and then shoulder check immediately before the turn.
So if you're turning right, shoulder check to the right and then shoulder check again as you make the turn.
You don't need to turn more than 90° degrees; just turn your head 90° degrees, your peripheral vision will take care of the rest.
But shoulder check, shoulder check, shoulder check.
That is the sixth way of being successful on a road test.
Tip #7 :: Do a Mock Test :: Practice Driving Test
To be successful on a road test, do a mock test.
If you haven't been involved in driver training with a professional driving instructor, go to a school and tell them that you want to do a mock test and go out with an instructor and do a mock test.
They will be able to identify the gaps in your abilities and skills and tell you what you need to brush up on, or work on to be successful on a road test.
Remember, driving instructors teach people how to pass driver's tests everyday.
They know what skills and abilities you need to have to be successful on a road test.
So number 7, do a mock road test.
Tip #8 :: Conduct a Pre Trip Inspection Prior to Road Test
Number eight, on the day of your road test do a pre-trip inspection of the vehicle.
Check the lights, check the horn, check the windshield wipers, make sure that everything is good.
Make sure that you have the registration and insurance in the glovebox; make sure that you have a license plate on the front and the rear of the vehicle, if your province or state requires that you have a license plate on the front and the rear.
Make sure that the decals are valid; make sure that the seat belts work; that the seats are secure; that nothing is floating around in the car.
Get rid of all of the garbage, because examiners do not want to sit in a car that is filthy dirty.
Leave the pets at home.
Make sure that you do a pre-trip inspection because you have a signal light out, or if you have a brake light out, they will not go out on a road test with you.
So make sure that you do a pre-trip inspection!
Don't just get Uncle John's car and show up at the road test, because you may not be able to go on your road test.
So take the time, do a pre-trip inspection in the morning before you show up your road test.
If you're going with a driving school, make sure that you ask the driving instructor if he or she has done a pre-trip inspection of the vehicle before you show up for the road test.
Tip #9 :: Bring Correct Paperwork
Number 9 is the correct paperwork.
Make sure that you have your paperwork to show up for the road test so you can take your road test.
You'll need your learner's licence, you will need a secondary piece of ID, and I would even bring a third piece of ID if you're a new driver, just in case.
You will also need money because there's a cost involved in taking the road test.
And any other paperwork that you think that you might need.
If you're unsure, contact your local authority--the MTO in Ontario, ICBC in British Columbia, the Ministry of Transportation in Alberta, and so on and so forth.
Have the correct paperwork.
You don't want to show up and not have the correct paperwork.
Because if you don't have the correct paperwork, they won't let you take your road test.
So check to make sure that you got your paperwork.
Tip #10 :: Poop, Breathe, Visualize!
When you go in for your road test, sign in, take the time, take a moment & go to the toilet.
There's nothing worse than trying to do a road test if you gotta go to the bathroom.
Pretty tough to be successful if you get your legs crossed.
So... go to the toilet.
Remember breathe: in through the nose, out through the mouth.
Breathe to your navel. This will force you to relax. You're very nervous, so breathe.
And finally, through all of your practice visualize the examiner saying to you: "You passed!"
If you visualize it in your head it is much higher probability that you're going to be successful on your road test.
So the last one: poop, breathe, visualize!
Go to the toilet, breath: in through the nose, out through the mouth.
Breath all the way into your navel.
Visualize passing your road test!
Good luck on your road test!
