Back To School: Ford Driving Skills For Life

"Justin Hughes" (justinhughes54) 10/17/2015 at 23:01 • Filed to: How to drive

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Anyone who has been to an autocross or track day knows how much of a learning experience it can be to find your limits and see how the car reacts when you push it just a little bit too far. Typical American driver training doesn’t include this. The first time a new driver gets to feel the pulsing of anti-lock brakes, or the tires losing traction in a turn, is typically right before their first accident. This is the worst possible time to have that experience. Armed with this knowledge beforehand, it may be possible to avoid that first accident in the first place.

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This is where !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! comes in. Ford DSFL, and other schools like it, put teens behind the wheel on a closed course and give them these experiences before they need it. Car control is a major part of it, but decision making, maintaining situational awareness, and the effects of distracted or impaired driving are also covered, often through experience in the car under an instructor’s guidance.

( Full disclosure: Ford invited me to attend a recent DSFL class local to me, and gave me yummy snacks and coffee. But they didn’t have to sell me on this idea. I was one of the first instructors for !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , a similar school in the Boston area, and have also helped teach !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , because I’m already a strong believer in teaching car control skills to new drivers.)

Car Control

A\cornerstone of any class like this is car control skills. Though fast cornering and using anti-lock brakes skills most enthusiasts take having for granted, they’re not required to get a driver’s license. Most average drivers, especially new ones, have never experienced them before. Ford DSFL has two exercises designed to fix that. In one of them, you drive a Focus toward a three lane split as fast as you can. At the last minute, two of the lanes get a red light, and you have to swerve into the lane that’s still green. You can definitely feel the body roll and weight transfer at this speed. I drove it smoothly the first time, but an inexperienced driver might slide, understeer, or not make it into the proper lane in time due to lack of experience. This exercise is an opportunity to make those mistakes in a safe environment, and learn from the instructor in the car with you what to do differently next time. Most of Ford DSFL’s instructors are graduates of or instructors for the !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! , and highly qualified to give such advice.

On the way back to the starting line from the lane change exercise is an ABS exercise. It’s simple – from the line, accelerate as fast as you can until the light turns red, then mash the brake pedal as hard as you can. This exercise serves two purposes. One is to give students the experience of ABS kicking in, teaching that the pulsing, vibrating, and grinding is perfectly normal so that they don’t lift off the pedal while braking. The other purpose is to show just how much distance it takes a car to stop. There are signs along the stop zone marking off car lengths, and it is designed to take the maximum marking of seven car lengths to stop if you do it right. This teaches that you can’t stop on a dime, and to watch how closely you follow the car in front of you.

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The other car control exercise puts students behind the wheel of a Mustang that has been specially modified with castors to be extremely prone to oversteer. The chalk ovals drawn on the pavement are quite small, but it doesn’t take more than a hard turn at walking pace for the back of the car to swing around. This could be great practice for drifting – my inclination was to try and drift my way around the entire oval. But my instructor kept me in check, having me steer into the skid and let off the gas to bring the car back under control again, which is the actual point of this exercise. Having !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! last month, I had a pretty good feel for what the car would do. But still, how cool is it for a new teenage driver to get behind the wheel of a Mustang and be encouraged to go slide it around? It’s super fun, and excellent practice for controlling oversteer.

Decision Making

You can have all of the car control skills in the world, but if you don’t use them properly, you’re still going to run into trouble on the road. Ford DSFL spends as much time teaching good decision making as car control skills.

The distracted driving exercise takes place on a slightly more complicated course. There are slaloms, roundabouts (we call them “rotaries” here in New England), and keep right/keep left signs. This is not a speed exercise, and it’s very easy to navigate when you’re paying attention. But for the second time through, the driver is told to do something you never should on the street – take out a phone and start texting someone. The instructor and “back seat drivers” add other distractions, like asking how many miles are on the car or to change the radio station. I shot video from the back seat while my fiancee drove, but the video turned out fairly boring. She has two young boys, and is already accustomed to a high level of distractions while driving. Additionally, she was incapable of typing on her phone while driving. She literally couldn’t force herself to do it while more important tasks, like driving and dealing with distractions in the car (I imitated her boys at their worst to “help”), took priority. Years of experience have taught her well, but it’s a great demonstration for a less experienced driver of just how badly you drive when texting and otherwise distracted at the same time.

This picture is not out of focus. The impaired driving exercise offers a variety of what I call “beer goggles.” They’re goggles that distort your vision to replicate what you would see at different levels of intoxication. Though a .06 BAC is still legal for drivers 21 and up in most states, your vision is still distorted, as the .06 goggles showed me.

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But we did more than just look through the goggles. We had the opportunity to drive an Escape through a very simple course while wearing goggles simulating a .10 BAC. Most states have a legal limit of .08 these days, but .10 was the limit for many years. Even better, an actual police officer watched you drive – not from his cruiser, but from our passenger seat.

So how did that work out for me?

The good news is that the cop did not pull me out of the car, handcuff me, and take me to jail. But he would have been right to do so if he’d caught me driving this badly impaired on a public road. My biggest problem was that I couldn’t see the track clearly. It was difficult to tell which set of white lines I was supposed to follow. I didn’t feel comfortable driving more than 5mph, according to the cop. He told me, “As a passenger, I do not feel comfortable riding with you. Especially since you just hit that cone. And that one.” This was with only my vision affected. My coordination and judgement were still sober, and screaming out to me that under any other circumstances this would be a very bad idea.

Again, this exercise gives students the experience of doing something they’re never supposed to do in a safe environment. This is a much better teacher than telling them “Because I said so,” because now they understand exactly why driving while distracted and impaired is a bad idea. I had never experienced “beer goggles” before myself (well, except maybe that time in college), and though I wouldn’t drink and drive anyway, I had no idea just how much of an effect it had on my driving ability.

How Stuff Works

Most people are appliance drivers. They don’t care about performance, handling, or any of that. All they care is that the car gets you from point A to point B reliably, time after time. I’ve known people who didn’t know how to change a flat tire, and didn’t care to learn. “That’s what AAA is for,” they’d say.

But even if you’re never going to dive under the hood and swap out your inline-4 for a V8, it’s good to know the basics about what makes a car go, and what the warning lights on the dashboard mean besides “it doesn’t go.” Ford DSFL devotes a section of the class to teaching exactly that. They go over, light by light, a picture of a dashboard with all of the warning lights on, what they mean, what’s informational (cruise control on, fasten seat belts), and what’s an actual problem (check engine, ABS). Then they look under the hood of a Fiesta, identify parts, and how to check and refill fluids. This is even more mechanical education than I got when I had my first car, and I wasn’t exactly clueless.

Higher Education

The classes I’ve helped teach placed more emphasis on car control skills. They’re important to learn, but I appreciate Ford DSFL having a more diverse curriculum. It’s not a performance driving school geared specifically toward car control, and gives new drivers a variety of experiences that all help to make them better drivers. I learned a lot from them as well. They’re a traveling roadshow – !!!error: Indecipherable SUB-paragraph formatting!!! to see when they’re coming to your area. Any school that puts better trained drivers on the road is a good thing in my book, and Ford Driving Skills for Life is an excellent option.

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NYankee1927 > Justin Hughes 10/17/2015 at 23:20

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These castors for the mustang...I assume those have a PN in the Ford racing catalog?

WhiskeyGolf > Justin Hughes 10/17/2015 at 23:26

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Very nice! I think I’m going to try a winter driving school class later this winter, for some FWD dorifto action (and education). Props to Ford for realizing it’s a legit problem that they actually contribute a solution to.

Birddog > Justin Hughes 10/17/2015 at 23:36

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“The first time a new driver gets to feel the pulsing of anti-lock brakes, or the tires losing traction in a turn, is typically right before their first accident”

Not true. It might be an age thing though. Things aren’t as easy now as they were in the early 90s.

Chariotoflove > Justin Hughes 10/17/2015 at 23:37

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Thank you for sharing this Justin. I wish all driver ed classes and high schools had this kind of course. I’m going to look for one when it is my kid’s time to learn to drive.

pip bip - choose Corrour > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 00:41

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if it’s any consolation , Australian driver training doesn’t have this either.

Justin Hughes > NYankee1927 10/18/2015 at 09:52

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I wish! They’re custom made to take just enough weight off the tires to let them slide freely, but leave just enough on them to accelerate gently and get the right sounds and sensations. They sure beat lunch trays.

Justin Hughes > Birddog 10/18/2015 at 09:54

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More and more schools like this are popping up, helping to fix this problem. When I taught for In Control in the early 2000s they were the first school of their kind in the Boston area. Now there are several, and you can even get an insurance discount for taking their classes.

Justin Hughes > pip bip - choose Corrour 10/18/2015 at 09:55

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I wouldn’t exactly call that a consolation...!

Drzhivago138 > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 12:36

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My chief concern—that maybe a RWD Mustang shouldn’t be used as a stand-in of the average driver’s experience—was mitigated later on the article.

Something like this, at least the second part (entry-level maintenance, what all the lights mean) should be compulsory for driver’s ed. Not everyone has a Dad who’s gonna tell them how to do everything.

manomanihatethemfancylads > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 12:51

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Not directly related to this particular school, but I keep asking this question every time a driver’s school post comes up, and hopefully I can eventually get a few answers.

I bought a Focus ST a few months ago, and am debating the free session at the Ford track in Utah. So has any other ST owners here done it? I have zero track experience, and am wondering if it is worth the flight out there, especially if you are a n00b like me.

burnedburner > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 12:52

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Check out Doug Herbert’s BRAKES program. PutOnTheBrakes.org. Former Top Fuel driver whose kids were killed in an accident, and he quit to dedicate his work to keeping teens safe on the road.

ICantStandNewJalopnik > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 13:01

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They’re quite helpful! Road America has classes for all skill levels and all seasons. And you get hot laps in some of the classes!

DeptOfHomelandObscurity > Chariotoflove 10/18/2015 at 13:24

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NC has kids take driver’s ed at 14, before even getting a permit. My high school was flanked by 2 major roads, and after spending the first hour watching the other student driver to figure out things like “where’s the turn signal?”, the instructor had me pull across the parking lot and immediately into traffic. I joke that I learned to drive by playing Gran Turismo, but it’s not far from the truth. Inadequate doesn’t begin to describe our driver’s ed course

BmacIL > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 13:28

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All of this should be mandatory for licensing. I can’t fathom why it’s not. Smh.

Ben Gould > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 13:59

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Fiat Chrysler Driving School should be a mandatory class for owners. Not a single trip goes by without all of the warning lights going off.

TailPipe Tales > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 14:18

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Awesome Justin! I am actually selected myself to do one of these right here in The Netherlands in exactly a week. Of course, I will be reporting on this event as well on here, as well as my own website (and maybe even on Medium)

Really looking forward to it. Great initiative by Ford.

BahamaTodd > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 14:46

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BMW has a similar program for teens. I took my younger brother to the free one earlier this year. They also had a free auto-x session for the adults.

http://www.bmwusa.com/Standard/Conte…

ffoc02 > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 15:14

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“The other car control exercise puts students behind the wheel of a Mustang that has been specially modified with castors to be extremely prone to oversteer.”

Are you sure it wasn’t just under inflated tires? I mean, you were at Gillette.

(I’ll see myself out.)

DonKeybals > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 16:20

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This is fantastic. I hope they will still be doing this when my kids are at driving age. That’s 10 years away.

Much of what they do will depend on what we do. Parents have a critical obligation to drive safely and obey traffic laws. If you road rage, text, speed, etc. you can't expect your offspring to not do the same.

Conan > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 16:40

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Educational reform I’d actually approve of.

dianebrat > manomanihatethemfancylads 10/18/2015 at 16:48

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I have a Focus ST and did the ST Octane Academy last summer and sprung for a 2nd day extra cost driving Mustangs, it was one of the most fantastic driving expereinces I’ve ever had, I’m not a noob, I’ve driven performance cars all my life, but I’d never done anything on the track and this taught me so much more than I thought it would and helped confirm on the track that my feeling on high perfomance driving could be backed up on the track, well worth going IMNSHO

anonymic > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 17:01

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ForD? Really?

manomanihatethemfancylads > dianebrat 10/18/2015 at 17:30

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Thanks for the feedback!

Justin Hughes > TailPipe Tales 10/18/2015 at 17:33

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I look forward to reading about what you think of it!

Justin Hughes > ffoc02 10/18/2015 at 17:35

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I should've seen comments like this coming!

Justin Hughes > anonymic 10/18/2015 at 17:36

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At least it's not FnorD.

BobWellington > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 19:39

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This is awesome! It’d be great if everyone could do this before getting a license. I consider this kind of stuff to be fun.

ShillyDevane > burnedburner 10/18/2015 at 20:00

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Is there anything similar for post-teens? I’d be interested in such a thing.

ffoc02 > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 20:59

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I figured there was a good reason you didn’t specify that you were at Foxboro.

I actually drove by the event on Friday, had no clue what it was. Thank you for the in depth coverage. As someone who is local to the area, there are way too many people around here who could benefit from even 10 minutes of driver training like this.

rearwheelhorse > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 21:48

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Please tell me the designer behind this was fired. “ForD”?

rearwheelhorse > burnedburner 10/18/2015 at 21:52

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I attended this a few years ago! I thought it was fun because I could slide a Kia soul around a speedway and my insurance is a tad cheaper now. Well worth the $99.

B6FTW > Justin Hughes 10/18/2015 at 22:34

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Good write-up on a great looking program. I wonder if there would be enough interest to start a similar program (perhaps with support from a dealership or manufacturer) in the southwest. We rarely get rain or snow here, and it is amazing how poorly people drive in even a light drizzle. Either 2 mph or 200, and crashes galore. This course would be helpful for more than just teens learning. I am lucky enough to be able to autox, but few that I know have had anything like that sort of experience, and I would feel better on the road if more people did...

brufleth > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 08:14

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Wait really? I want to become a better driver AND save on my ridiculously expensive car insurance.

schwartz > dianebrat 10/19/2015 at 09:13

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I had my session reserved, but it was couple months before my wedding and I had to cancel it as I didnt have the time or money to be going across the country for this. I really regret it.

Justin Hughes > rearwheelhorse 10/19/2015 at 09:14

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The designer must be t3h l33t d35!gN0Rz.

Justin Hughes > B6FTW 10/19/2015 at 09:18

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Ford DSFL travels all around the country, and invites parents to join kids for it as well. Street Survival classes happen all over the place too. As far as I’m concerned, the more schools like this, and the more competent drivers there are on the road, the better. Especially after I just almost hit two incompetent drivers on my morning commute...

B6FTW > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 09:26

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I checked their schedule and they are doing a day in the Albuquerque area. If it draws a large crowd, maybe it would be worth organizing something more consistent, say twice a year, or inviting similar organizations.

Chariotoflove > DeptOfHomelandObscurity 10/19/2015 at 09:48

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I had a decent driver ed class at high school, but it was the standard kid gloves on suburban roads. No experience with what might go wrong. Looking back, I see how unprepared I was to handle problems. Looks like you at least got adrenaline training.

Mexifinn > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 10:19

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This is pretty cool... it’ll be at least 13 years or so before I have to worry about my daughter learning to drive, but I’m hoping on educating her on a lot of things car related well before then.

When I was about 25, I did the Team O’Neill winter driving school in NH, and it was one of the best things I did. You use your car, and it’s a mix of indoors education and outdoors driving in low grip situations (ie - snow and ice). One of the best things I ever did to be a better driver.

One kid in the class was only 18 and was sent up by his parents which I think was great. Teach early!

Justin Hughes > Mexifinn 10/19/2015 at 10:37

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I hear Team O’Neil’s winter driving school is excellent. I’ve taken the two-day rally school myself, and absolutely loved it. I’d really like to go back and take days 3 and 4 sometime.

Mexifinn > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 10:45

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Yeah, one of these days I would love to do a rally school. But I heavily recommend doing the winter school. It’s fun and usually some cool people around.

Just one thing to be aware of - it’s not one-on-one with instructors. You all take turns driving and often sit in someone else’s car: 1 instructor, 3 students. At the end they let you drive the full course as quickly as you feel comfortable with.

staghounds > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 10:50

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I’m too old to get into these schools, but it wouldn’t hurt to take a class. Autocross sounds like a good practice, but I’d like instruction first so I know the principles. What are some good school suggestions for appliance drivers who want to get some step-up skills and are old enough to vote buy a pistol?

Justin Hughes > staghounds 10/19/2015 at 11:16

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An autocross school might be a good start. My local BMW CCA chapters require you to take an advanced driving skills school that teaches this stuff before they’ll let you do an HPDE with them, and people have taken just the school with no intention continuing on to the track.

While these schools are geared toward newly licensed teens, they may allow old farts like us to take them as well. I checked out Ford DSFL as a journalist and didn’t take the full class, but they do encourage parents and kids to take it together.

staghounds > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 11:35

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Good tip! Althouh I don’t have a child. Maybe I could borrow one.

Katsumoto > Drzhivago138 10/19/2015 at 12:14

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Yea then theyre asking their friend who works on cars on the check engine light that turned out to be a loose gas cap.

conrader > manomanihatethemfancylads 10/19/2015 at 12:25

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Do it. Do it do it do it! It was the most fun I’ve ever had in a car (and with many other things as well)! I felt like it was extremely educational as well. I drove that whole day and was so amped afterwards that I drove like 1000 miles after STOA that evening/night/morning with my wife.

zdkfocus > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 12:29

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0.06 is essentially a buzz. This is not what your vision is like after what amounts to a couple 60 Minute IPAs. Even at 0.1 a lot of people won’t have blurred vision. That said, short of feeding people alcohol, I guess there’s no other way to approximate the effects of driving under the influence.

I should also point out that I’m not saying it’s OK to drive with a BAC of 0.06. But there’s a reason you never see DUIs in the paper where the driver had a BAC of 0.08 or 0.09. They’re almost always 0.1+; often much higher. Because that’s where you have to be to be visibly drunk.

manomanihatethemfancylads > conrader 10/19/2015 at 12:49

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Thanks!

manomanihatethemfancylads > schwartz 10/19/2015 at 12:52

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My wife has a Spirit card (dont' ask, not my choice) and plenty of miles, but they do not get particularly close to the track, and I would have a 3-4 hour drive to get there. I drive all day for work, so having to drive to the track would put me in the wrong mindset for the experience. That is why I am wondering how good it is, as I will likely end up just paying for tickets from a different airline.

yeahyeahyea > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 13:20

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This should seriously be required to get your license.

Justin Hughes > yeahyeahyea 10/19/2015 at 14:12

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I agree!

schwartz > manomanihatethemfancylads 10/19/2015 at 14:39

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You ever been in the Rockies? I was planning on flying to Denver just for the beautiful drive. But the flight, rental car, and hotel just was not in the cards.

manomanihatethemfancylads > schwartz 10/19/2015 at 15:15

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Flew to Denver once, and from there drove to Colorado Springs. How far would the drive be from there to Utah?

Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 16:31

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On those glasses. Is that what you SEE with a 0.06 BAC, or are they a little worse to address concentration levels as well? As in, you can’t actually make a sober person’s concentration worse for the sake of an experience, in fact when a sober person uses those glasses they would concentrate even harder, so do they make the vision even more blurry to address this and make it closer to the mark? Or is it simply a vision thing, which you then are told “to this you must also imagine that your concentration levels are lower, which makes it even more deadly”?

I'm not belittleing the glasses, I'm genuinely interested. I hope that was clear enough.

Justin Hughes > Smallbear wants a modern Syclone, local Maple Leafs spammer 10/19/2015 at 16:41

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I get what you mean. Only the vision is affected. My coordination and judgement were still sober. Though while reaching for the shifter to put it into drive I accidentally whacked the MyFordTouch screen instead. I had to count how many notches I moved it (reverse, neutral, drive) because I couldn’t see well enough to read the markings. My coordination was affected because I just couldn’t see what I was doing.

My judgement was all there, though. That’s good, because I fully realized just how bad an idea driving this impaired on the street would be!

schwartz > manomanihatethemfancylads 10/19/2015 at 17:10

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I-70 is around about 9 hours of some of the most beautiful highway I have ever been on. I hear the 15 from Vegas is also pretty however never been that way. Is about 6 hours from Vegas. I don’t drive for my job, however I do love driving in the mountains.

ocbrad1 used to be iamhoff but is now just wandering around > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 17:11

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Someone else mentioned this, and I’m going to repeat it, but for a different reason. While I personally like the idea of a Mustang set up to show what happens when traction breaks and the rear end comes around, it’s not as realistic. I say this because the majority of cars out there these days (especially those that the new drivers are driving) are front-drive. Corollas, Civics, Focuses (Focii?), Cobalts, Jettas, even CUVs like the CRV, Escape, etc. tend to be FWD based/biased. Showing the type of conditions where those cars will lose control (more typically understeering) would be a useful element.

manomanihatethemfancylads > schwartz 10/19/2015 at 17:23

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As do I, but nine hours behind the wheel would seriously impair my enjoyment at the track. Even four hours would take some of the fun out of it. Better that I just pay for the flight, if the track experience is worth it.

Justin Hughes > ocbrad1 used to be iamhoff but is now just wandering around 10/19/2015 at 17:32

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I think understeer would come up in the lane change exercise. You drive a Focus, and though neither the instructor nor I plowed through it, an inexperienced driver might, especially if they’re doing it wrong.

Shiarlis > Justin Hughes 10/19/2015 at 20:14

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SN95 WHEELS!

ocbrad1 used to be iamhoff but is now just wandering around > Justin Hughes 10/20/2015 at 16:35

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Yeah, probably so. But that’s the thing, figure out the standard “series of events” that most often leads a new driver into understeering (i.e. over-cooking it on a freeway on or off-ramp), and set up a course section to duplicate that so the kids can get a feel for how it happens, what the sensations are when traction is lost, and how best to recover.