The only test specific task we practised was the gearchange exercise. I was on full concentration from the start, as I thought that a pre-test mistake would not do my confidence any good.
Fortunately for me (not the readers of this blog) nothing happened. It was just a case of driving around and ultimately turning up at the test station.

As we arrived quite early we parked up around the corner, had a coffee, and stared at others doing their test.
This build up period is the worst, as you just want to get it over and done with. Thank god time flew by and it was time to drive the truck into the test station; though not before having a banana to up my energy for the test.

I parked the truck and Alan and I went to sit inside the building to wait for the examiner.
This is where the nerves really kicked in. Minutes seemed endless.
Then my examiner, Chris, turned up. He instantly made a friendly impression, which helped.

Once at the truck he told me that there’s nothing to be nervous about and that we’re all on the same side. Then he asked me my five questions. The one on wheels – fine. The one on the body – fine. The one on the air pressure – fine. The one on the suspension – fine.
Then – “so tell me how you would load this vehicle”.
I told him I would lower the tail lift, open up the truck and start loading. He wanted more though – what had I missed?
He could tell I looked puzzled and said “think of in terms of load safety”.
That made it clear – the load should be secure, even and not over the maximum weight.

With those complete, he asked me to perform the reversing exercise, which required me to reverse the truck to within 3 foot of a wooden fence within a set of cones.
I took my time and it went smoothly.

Only at this point did Chris hop in the truck. It was time for the ‘controlled stop’. As I had enjoyed this so much in practise that went fine as well. So, out on the open road…..

My mind was going at a million miles an hour. I was probably checking my mirrors way to often, but I thought: “Rather too much than too little.”
At my first roundabout we took a right and I forgot to cancel the right indicator, which Chris kindly brought to my attention. At the following roundabout my left arm started thinking for itself and changed into third gear when fifth would have been sufficient.
I told myself to calm down and just do a SAFE drive. That is what they are looking for.

The country lanes were quite narrow and the corners generally tight, but I was just easing the truck around them. All was going fine until Chris asked me to pull over at the next convenient point. I was in the middle of a small village and around 300m from the exit. I thought I should leave the pulling over until I had passed all the houses and driveways…..WRONG.

I had pulled over just after the start of the country road. This is where Chris turned to me and said that he was going to mark me down, because I would have been better off stopping in the village. After he explained it to me I understood why.
He also said that I needn’t worry as it is not a fail. Relief.

The next part of the test included the gearchange exercise, which went well, and some town driving. To test me again, I was asked to “pull over in the next convenient place”. I paid more attention this time and got it right.

Heading back to the test station I had a feeling that I hadn’t get a serious fault, but I was praying that I had less than 15 minors.
On the home stretch I got in a bit of a muddle stopping on a hill before a traffic light – but dealt with it correctly (though I still had thoughts of failure at the back of my mind).

Then came the worst bit. We pulled back into the test station and he told me to cut the engine and wait while he consulted his notes. That wait is pure torture.

But then the moment came. “I can inform you that you have passed.” Most people would have been very happy with that – I was ecstatic.
Though someone else seemed even happier – my trainer Alan. The examiner actually asked me to shut the truck window (this wasn’t due to Alan hopping around outside, but a confidentiality clause – that’s at least what he told me).

One simple thing I can say from this week is that truck driving requires a lot of skill, concentration and often patience – but most of all it’s good fun. I would recommend it to anyone.

Look out for the next set of blogs – Class C + E training.