Matt62 wrote:As always, a fascinating discussion but I am not sure how relevant the last parts would seem to the majority of viewers or contributors to the site?
To elaborate; I personally became interested in 'advanced driving' because many years ago someone in the company I worked for decided that all of the company car drivers should take (and pass) the ROSPA test. Accordingly, we all had a couple of hours training with an interesting, if slightly insane ex police fleet trainer and then booked our tests. I ended up with a 'Silver' and an interest in 'AD', somewhat inspired by the examiners comments. Three years later, reading Roadcraft got me a 'Gold', and I have maintained this ever since over a number of re tests. I find forums such as this one, interesting, but I cannot imagine that I would ever join a local ROSPA or IAM group. I am almost certainly a far safer (and probably faster) driver than I was before I took the first test, but I can't imagine that I would pass muster against many of the enthusiasts and/or professionals who contribute regularly to the discussions on here.
For me, the most important thing is not perfection and 'style' but encouraging a larger number of people to improve their driving beyond the point that they descended to after gaining a full licence.
encouraging people to improve is indeed very important...
a realisation though that:
- the driving test is not the end of the abilty journey
- that IAM / RoSPA is not the end of the ability journey
will both help that purpose...
the great thing about the internet is that not eveything has to be of interest to everyone, and I certainly hope that we don't dumb down the discussion on here to items only considered to be of interest to the majority...
we used analogies recently of music - it would be like saying lets not discuss pavarotti / freddie mercury / {insert top musician here} as the majority of folks won't reach that level...
in reality the discussion here about style is as applicable to someone in IAM / RoSPA as it is at higher levels - if the majority of those viewing, or members of this forum have no interest in that then I can only imagine that they are fixated on AD being about roadcraft and passing IAM / RoSPA exams - and that is to miss the point enormously
Alasdair