There are many and varied driving skills one can pick up. There’s the ability to nail a park first time, the ability to rescue a slide, or the ability to actually get in the right lane well before your highway exit comes up. My question is this—what weird driving skill have you picked up?
I consider myself a capable driver, but far from an exceptional one. I’ve got a few track days under my belt, and I’ve learned how to keep a car out of the wall on a mountain pass. I can even drive a manual! But as far as special skills go, though, there’s one in particular I learned back in my hometown.
I used to live just off a main road, signposted at 60 km/h (~37 mph). That road featured a roundabout, ostensibly an obstacle that required one to slow down and steer around it. However, us locals knew that with a deft hand on the wheel, you could holeshot this thing without touching the brakes.
Was it a useful skill? No. Did it scare passengers when you unexpectedly whipped straight through the empty roundabout? Yes. Was it safe? Actually, yeah, it was pretty much a straight shot. Obviously, not something to be performed with traffic around, but if the road was clear? You could make it through, no problem.
This is largely a useless skill. It didn’t teach me a superhuman level of car control, nor did it translate into quick laptimes when I headed to the track. It was just a fun thing us locals took pride in. That was our roundabout and we knew how to nail it.
Friends of mine had their own abilities. I knew a guy called Pitchwizard who made his money stacking shelves in his younger years. When he’d check out of the mall carpark late after hours, he had plenty of space to master the 180-degree handbrake turn in his dope Honda Civic.
I was so impressed when I rode passenger that I later picked up the talent myself in my MX-5. As someone who grew up in the Australian culture, more often obsessed with the more basic entertainment of mere burnouts, the oft-maligned handbrake turn was a more delectable artform to my youthful tastes.
Since this is Autopian Asks, I’ll now yield the floor to you. What special unique skill have you picked up behind the wheel? You get bonus points if it’s only applicable to you, your friends, or some incredibly specific geographical location. Go!
Image credits: PhotoPum RanaRoja via Unsplash License, Google Images, Lewin Day
I have an uncanny ability to make tall vehicles with spongy suspension and lots of body roll (think a truck or an SUV) take turns at high speed much smoother than some professional racing drivers in track cars. I used to outrun some of the local boy-racers on the mountain roads in an F-150 using this skill. There’s a very narrow margin between where the body roll is as far as it will go, and the actual inside tires are lifting up, and many people are too scared to get near that margin.
I don’t know how I could’ve developed it other than just being reckless.
There was a big roundabout on my way to work which didn’t sée much traffic.
If it was raining and the traffic light, I was taking that sucker slightly drifting … my FWD Clio 2.
It wasn’t some crazy power slide, but taking that curve beyond the tires grip was fun.
I guess my trailer backing skills. When I worked at a rental yard, I could come down our road and do a bit of an S turn that would set up a wood chipper to back into the driveway right in front of the gas pump.
I also once rode a motorcycle home from work in second gear after a shift spring broke.
Oh God, reversing a trailer still gives me PTSD. I haven’t had any mishaps during the rare times I trailer a boat, but I’m still embarrassed by my lack of trailering skills every time I have to do it.
I’ve backed up all kinds of trailers, but the hardest was the chipper truck- since you can’t see the chipper if you are backing it up straight
Fortunately for me this was a stake body so I had some clue where the chipper was
This definitely isn’t as impressive as some of these other comments, but it’s something….I hope.
Haven’t quite made the equivalent “muscle memory” thing in my Prius yet (turning on Bluetooth on my phone for Android Auto, for example, and just general “getting situated” means the time between getting in, turning it on, and putting it in drive is variable), but in my old van I was often able to do a very rehearsed, “mechanical” sequence of:
step up
sit down
simultaneously buckle seat belt + ignition
flip down armrest (covers seat belt buckle so I always had to put it up to unbuckle)
shift into drive
…and immediately start moving.
Also, I will bang the drum that that damn van had the best (right armrest for LHD) armrest placement ever. I could rest my elbow on the armrest while still having a firm grip on the wheel. It’s not the same in the Prius.
As a Minnesotan, snow driving. And not the ‘it’s kinda slippy out’ snow driving, but the full blown 6-12″ of fresh snow, drifting corners but not ending up in the ditch kind of snow driving. Many years of whipping shitties in empty parking lots and on frozen lakes getting a feel for what the tires are doing and how to react.
My 2nd gen Xterra was a damn near perfect vehicle for these shenanigans. The traction control was forgiving enough to let you drift around a corner and with the right amount of throttle it would just pull you straight again while in 4hi. Try to overdo it and the TC would intervene just enough to pull you back in line, it was a really good system. And if you turned it off you could spin circles on the spot if the conditions were right.
I’ve gotta spend some more time figuring out the Colorado, first truck I’ve owned and we’ve only had one properly snowy winter since I bought it.
I am fast losing what remaining snowy driving skills I had after 2 years of dry pavement. Took the Subaru on a fire road recently just to confirm I still have some muscle-memory left. Did confirm my right foot still knows to throttle out of corners in an awd. I was worried my rwd with old, hard summer tires had made it timid
Can drive stick and steer with only my off-hand(the left) in order to hold hands with(and impress) lady passengers
Back in high school I and one of my good friends spent so much time trying to outdo each other. When I demonstrated that I could drive stick with my left hand out the window, he escalated by driving (automatic) with his left hand AND foot out the window. Obviously I had to top that, so there I am, driving a stick shift with my left hand and left foot out the window. I would not say the shifts were exactly smooth, but…
As some others have mentioned, I can shift without the clutch, both on motorcycles (very easy) and cars (not as easy). I’ve had several clutch slave cylinders leave me without a pedal, but I always got where I needed to go.
I swear I have a sixth sense for when other drivers are about to do something stupid. It freaks my partner out because sometimes I’ll verbalize what I know they’re gunna do (“seriously; what is wrong with you!?”) *before* they do it. Examples include merging into me, pulling out in front of me, etc. Learning to ride a motorcycle definitely honed this skill and has saved me from several accidents.
Situational awareness is far too rare, but essential if you want to become an old motorcyclist.
This is what scares the shit out of me about my gf starting to ride. She’s not a bad driver, but she’s ever reacting rather than being aware and prepared.
She goes so slow that that works for her so far, but I worry. It’s not just the 90° in front of you. It’s the merger that doesn’t see you or worse, doesn’t care that you’re there, it’s the speeder coming in at 80+ to the back of the traffic you’re last in line for. You’ve got to be ready and assertive.
YES! Your GF and my BF would get along well. He drives slowly and carefully, but is always reacting, never preparing or observing. Even stuff like the light turning yellow takes a second or two to register. It terrifies me to ride with him.
I do the same thing about calling what’s about to happen. When my wife is in the car with me, Ill say something to the effect of “check out this dude coming up on the right behind us, he’s gonna shoot the shoulder and cut off that tractor trailer.” She’ll reply with why aren’t you watching the cars in front of us? Well I am, but Im also watching for the threats coming from behind as well. Too many people too easily distracted nowadays
Same – seeing the moves before they play out
Agreed. Bought my first bike in 1981 and quickly developed a spidey sense of when someone was going to merge into me or turn left in front of me. Usually, it was a twitch of their shoulders that was the tell.
Right foot clutch
Left foot brake
Middle foot gas
Comment of the day!
It took me decades to master, but now I can literally go weeks without flipping off another driver. (Oh, I still want to …)
Backing up really fast?
Years ago, the house we were renting had a long twisting driveway, maybe about 200 yards long. On crumbier days, I’d take my son, who was pre-school aged at the time to the end of the driveway in my car, and we’d sit in comfort while waiting for his bus.
Once, it picked him up, I’d drive back to the house. Originally, I’d pull out into the street, do a 3 point turn and head back up my driveway. Then, one day I was feeling lazy and decided to just drive in reverse the whole way back. Then, I started doing it everyday. And, I got faster and faster at it, until the point that I had maxed out my car’s reverse speed limiter.
Backing up small trailers. I used to be able to back up my 4×8 utility trailer fairly well. I can back up my 15 foot long camper into a spot fairly rapidly. Much to the chagrin of the other campers looking for entertainment.
I can make a Suzuki Samurai spin like a top.
Seemingly a disappearing skill: knowing how wide my car is.
Especially on 1-way, 1-lane streets of NYC (which are actually 60-something feet wide; big enough for a row of parked cars on both sides, room to double park and room for one lane of traffic) people grind to a halt when passing a double-parked car.
In reality, unless they’re an >80″ truck, there’s often several feet of clearance, but they treat as though they’re one flick of the steering wheel away from grinding paint.
It usually freaks out my passengers, but I thread the needle at a normal 10-15mph speed without ever touching my brakes because I know there’s room.
You’d fit right in in India, where every driver seemingly comes out of the womb with the innate ability to know, to the centimeter, exactly how close they are to other cars on narrow roads.
It used to baffle me how bad people were at knowing how wide their car is until I realized most people don’t actually have their mirrors adjusted correctly. Their mirrors are looking out as far as possible and they can’t see the ground or the rear corner of their vehicle. When they already can’t see the front of the car because it’s rounded and slopes down not being able to see the rear corners spooks them. There are also some mirror shapes that have that annoying beveled corner that cuts out your ability to see the ground no matter how you adjust the mirror.
Backing a 30-foot trailer into a spot on the first attempt.
Turning a perfectly working vehicle into one that is not perfectly working, usually with a few extra bolts.
I drifted a fire engine, once.
A lot of driving tasks are mundane compared to flying helicopters though.
There’s a road near me with a long series of roundabouts I used to travel regularly on my way home from work, and I got so used to knowing exactly where the kerb edges were so I could take the straightest line possible in my Hiace work van.
But the one that I perfected on my trips to work back when I was able to commute on my GPz750-A3 was a pair of synchronised traffic lights at a freeway overpass, where the first set of lights went green a few seconds before the second set. Over time I worked out that launching the bike exactly on the first green just hard enough to slightly lift the front wheel, then keeping it full throttle got me to the stop line at the second set of lights EXACTLY at the speed limit, at the EXACT moment the light went green. Usually when I did this there would be a couple of cars siting there waiting for the green light, andI suspect I gave a few drivers near heart attacks when I appeared from nowhere at speed, lane split through the traffic and shot past just as the light changed.
A lifetime no accidents 16-66. Can also parallel park first time every time 6” from curb. I did have 4 major motorcycle accidents but the other person ran into me.
Driving the speed limit and stopping for red lights are skills more people need to learn.
Stopping at a stopsign is a long lost art.
Indeed
BEFORE the crosswalk
And before turning right.
“Walking” my Jeep.
With any Jeep that has crawl control, you can operate the jeep while walking next to it.
With the doors off and the jeep in 4-low, press the selec-speed button, place the shifter in manual, and push the shifter forward to lock it into 0.6 mph cruise control. You can now hop out of the Jeep, and it will continue to crawl forward, allowing you time to walk to the back of the jeep, retrieve a beverage from your cooler, walk back up to the driver door, hop in, and continue on without holding up traffic behind you.
Always good for a laugh.
I used to do this with my ’48 Willys PU. It had a hand-throttle, so set that just above idle, put it in 1rst low, get out, open gate, wait for the rig to put-put through, close gate, grab beer from cooler on the way back to the cab. Repeat.
Also good for self-spotting tricky off road sections, I’d think.
I’m quite good at clutch-less shifting and also at changing from work clothes to sport clothes when I’m late to the gym or a softball game. Both with a manual or an auto
I can put out an under-dash electrical fire in an MGB barehanded without coming to a stop. Or at least I have done so. Twice.
I’m good at sensing quicksand and can avoid it before getting in it. If I do get in it I can drop gear ULTRA fast and GTFO. Helps to air down real low BEFORE heading out. Never ever, slow down, never ever ever ever stop. When we’re on long treks they send me first in convoy.
Driving a left hand drive 6 speed r53 using only my left hand and left leg after I got attacked by an inmate at work, and injured nerves in both right arm and leg. Getting to the E.D. from work was not easy, then I had to repeat it again and again getting to physical therapy for four months. My right arm took the longest to heal so I ended up shifting left handed for another two months after the physical therapy ended. To be clear I could still walk etc. not well but I could move around, but I had neither the strength nor the fine motor skill to run the pedals and shifter.
As an owner of only manual vehicles, I’ve always wondered about this so thank you for sharing and making me feel a little better that I might actually be able to manage it if I had to!
Hope you’re all healed now though.
Feel for you here amigo.
After 10 knee surgeries, I also learned to clutch with the right leg as well.
As someone who needs a hip replacement, (on both sides) can also put right leg across the seat to relieve pain, elevate.
I wish you all the best.
Not nearly as bad or as accomplished as yours, twisted my right ankle – tore ligaments from the bone it was later found. Drove my 440 4spd Challenger to the hospital shifting without the clutch. They fixed me up as best they could with a splint and bandage and sent me home. I had to drive the car for work, and to and from the hospital for treatment for the next 4 months.
That’s as much of a story about driving skill as it is an indictment of the US health care system.
One road near me that is the direct route from my house to I-75 South here in FL has four roundabouts in about a mile and a half. I know the racing line through all of them, in both directions. Good fun when there it’s any other traffic, which is most of the time.
I suppose my weird driving skills are from my long ago days driving coaches. I can parallel park a 40′ bus, and I am perfectly comfortable shifting without using the clutch “floating the gears”. Though it’s a lot easier in a big diesel vehicle with a non-syncro transmission than in most cars.
I’m proficient at the bootlegger/Rockford turnaround in F and RWD flavors on pretty much any surface and AWD on anything loose. I love my Suburban and Subaru toothed bits too much to attempt it on dry pavement.
And while my IRL superpower is that I rarely/ever wait in line – the line always forms behind me as I live 3 minutes in the future – 100% of the time I find the longest, surliest line/border patrol agent on our twice yearly sojourns to Buffalo from Michigan.
cruising on interstate 5-10 mph over the limit (fully 1/3 of traffic going faster around here) – speed up to pass slower moving traffic, then pull to right and slow back down to cruising speed (most folks stay at that passing speed and then continue to ratchet their speed up and up to play nascar with strangers…).
i often get a hundred yards plus of empty highway in front and behind me with a cluster of traffic at either end of that bubble of safety.
This is an excellent skill, and one I find very pleasing when I can do it. The state of “flow” achieved is incredibly mentally relaxing.
I often try to see how long I can go without hitting the brakes at all, just adjusting speed in advance to account for upcoming cars, situations, etc.
Along with that, the ability to time stop and go traffic driving so as to never have to stop or shift is priceless. Honed from years of dealing with Rt 128 around Boston when I have to go to my office in Waltham.
I’m sure there have been studies about why drivers cluster when there is an ample highway available, but it always baffled me, and has been the case for my 44 years of driving.
The only negative about being in the no-mans zone, you can become an easy target for a speed gun.
If you ran a good radar detector back in the day, you could smoothly ease off your speed and drop back in the zone so that the traffic behind was catching up to you. Generally, the big cluster of cars now going faster would pick up the radar lock if you’d dropped back sufficiently.
I’d assume it’s because people like to have others around to gauge their own speed. Or it’s just because idiots tend to gather in groups.
As I mentioned above, I’ll usually only drive 3-5mph above the limit. I’ve had so many times when a driver would zoom up behind me on a completely empty highway and proceed to tailgate. Not some 2 lane that’s tough to pass on, but a 4 or even 6 lane and I’m in the right lane with the others wide open for passing. Yet they will sit there on my ass for miles. I’ll usually click the cruise control down 1mph every minute or two and even then I’ve sometimes had to drop 10mph below the speed limit before they finally pass. It doesn’t make any sense.
That’s my general MO while driving, although usually just 5 over. Yes, it’s really nice when you get in between the traffic clusters.
Also, I absolutely cannot stand the people who won’t speed up to pass. I may only be going 68 in a 65, but when I come up on someone slower I’ll boot it to 72-75 to get by quick and slow back down.