40km/h K53 Driving Test Myth
So, your friends told you to just stick to 40km/h on your driving test, did they? This would have been contrary to proper K53 form, regrettably.
Yip, it’s a myth. The thesaurus defines myth as : legend, fairy tale, saga, fiction, illusion, untruth, fabrication and falsehood, among others.
In short, your friends don’t realise that their advice could actually be costing you dearly on your driving test. In fact, part of your test is Speed Control, and that also includes going tooooooooo slowly.
Thing is, MANY driving test applicants have either not had technical pointers from their driving instructor to highlight the dangers of going too slowly, but they lend out their ears to their friends and, more often than not, collect all sorts of bad advice.
It may be well to now mention that the speed limit on most roads you’ll be doing your test on, is 60km/h. At times this may vary to 40km/h where there are speed bumps and/or other obstructions or traffic calming measures in the road. On a road, or piece of road, with issues such as visibility and/or congestion, etc, it is hardly wise to race around at 60km/h when 40km/h would be the better and safer option. Common sense escape many, I know.
Some driving schools, however, keep their clients at driving 40km/h throughout their training and this is then the speed that the client is used to at the time of their driving test. Bad Idea!
Just ask yourself if the average driver out there on the road, adhering to proper speed limits, are driving around at 40km/h all the time. Nope – they drive like normal people!! Sooooo, when it says 60km/h, they actually drive 60km/h.
Wellll, I have a surprise for you!
If you creep around at 40km/h on your driving test, YOU ARE piling up the penalties. In fact, it’s such a harsh penalty that you accumulate 5 penalty points EVERY 5 – 8 SECONDS that you are travelling too slowly. Your examiner may…or may not actually make a remark about your speed to give you a hint that you are driving too slowly. When you don’t adjust your speed immediately, the penalties start…
The idea is for the government to grant licenses to those that can drive as near-normal as possible since the new driver will be released into The Big World and will share the roads with other drivers that travel at normal speed. In their attempt to make it as reasonable as possible, the total penalties allowed on an average 20-minute driving test is 168.
Trust me, if a driving license applicant accumulates anything near 168 penalty points on a Road Test, then they SHOULD NOT even have booked their test. This is the very first indicator that an applicant is veeeeeeeeeeery far away from being adequately prepared for a K53 Driving Test.
At the time of your test, you should comfortably be able to travel at 55 – 60km/h, process all events that need your attention, while doing all your safety checks like the Single Blind Spot and 3-Point Check. I mean easily…second nature…instinctual.
Whatever you do, get your speed up and keep it constant, starting with your training and throughout your driving test, granted that you will be driving within the limits and conditions of the road, that is.
THE ONLY exception is when your driving test is done in wet weather. Then you will be allowed to travel slower that 60km/h, clearly since you would have to take extra safety into consideration where it comes to slippery roads, visibility, earlier braking and water-logged stretches on a road, to name a few.
Well…all the best on your test, and keep it cool, OK?
Oh yeah, i forgot to mention…
I’ve seen previous test results of new clients where they have accumulated as much as 100 penalties for going to slowly.
Given other penalties for the occasional single blind spot, 3-point check and 5-point check that they missed, among others.
In a few cases, it was their speed which eventually proved to be the biggest factor in their failure