[Samba]

Every driver thinks - 'I'm the best'.

Result- More accidents and roads are getting unsafe day by day.

So its always good to have a reality check before thinking 'I am the best'.

Movies like Fast & furious or Dhoom encourages the youth for speed but they do not tell how safe it will be.

Its better to be safe than sorry.

What was the program all about?

We are a group of car lovers from Kolkata, who love to travel cross-country in our own cars. So safety is a major factor for us. We all know how much Team Bhp cares about safety. So being a Bhpian safety was our primary concern. Plus West Bengal government has been campaigning about road safety with their 'Safe drive save lives' slogan, which has had an impact on all of us.

So few of us from Team Bhp decided to take safety a step further and planned a program in Kolkata where 40-50 car enthusiasts will be trained by an internationally trained professional trainer using Low Risk Driver Training methods. There were Bhpians (majority) & non Bhpian's too. This was open for all. The participants were from diverse backgrounds, varying from IT Industry, Doctors, Business professionals and even from Kolkata Police. The trainer was none other than Dbhpian SS-Traveller whose thread's on safety quotient are superbly popular in Team Bhp.

Thanks to Bhpian HimadriMondal for his immense help in the arrangements. It was impeccable.

A big shout out to Bhpian Dip27in, Shomshree, Delix for their backend support.

Last but not the least a special thanks to Mr Prosenjit Chatterjee from Kolkata Traffic Police who joined us in the program and enlightened us with his vast experience and attended the full training too.

Low Risk Driver Training is a form of Defensive Driving with certain significant differences. Defensive driving means”driving to save lives, time and money, in spite of the conditions around the driver and the actions of others.” This is the “everyone else is an idiot” school of thought. Low Risk Driver Training has the same objectives as Defensive Driving, but with a huge change in philosophy where the onus is placed on the driver to take fewer risks regardless of right of way or legal right, yet still be assertive. In general terms, Defensive driving is about imparting skills, Low Risk Driver Training is about changing driver attitude and that is a very significant difference. Low Risk Driving supersedes Defensive Driving.

On 18th August 2018, this Low Risk Driver Training programme was held at the Sojourn Banquet Hall at Salt Lake.

The materials provided during the training -


We also received reminder stickers with the key points to keep in mind when driving as we were taught. (The white one)


We were also given a form to enable us to self-assess our own driving quality as well as test our learning in small groups of 4-5 people on the road.

[Samba]

The start time was at 8-30 Am. After having a light breakfast & registration the training session started by 9-30 am.



From 9-30 Am to 1-30 Pm the followings were covered-

Focus on-

Tyres & pre-drive safety

The contents included doing a POWDER check of the vehicle (Petrol, Oil, Water, Damage, Electrics, Rubber), before getting into the driver's seat.

Driving posture

A detailed discussion took place about how to adjust the driver's seat and sit comfortably to enable one to focus on the road as well as avoid fatigue on long drives.

Seat belts & airbag

There was a discussion on how seat belts and airbags enhance safety and the limitations and dangers of these devices in cars.

Braking & ABS

We learnt about the advantages and disadvantages of ABS as well as other brake-linked safety systems such as Electronic Stability Control.

Driver risk & risk taking behavior

There was a lot of discussion about the psychological attitude of the driver and how to adapt to different road and traffic conditions, while keeping in mind the various safety needs of the driver as well as the vehicle he is driving.

Scanning & observation

It was literally an eye-opener to learn how much of information we miss out when using our peripheral vision, and how we can eliminate our blind spots by setting our ORVMs correctly and doing head checks routinely.

Evidence based driving & reasonable Risk
(Thanks to Bhpian Highway_Nation for sharing his dash-cam video's to analyse the mistakes.)

We discussed at length how to micro-observe the various evidences which would indicate whether it is safe to proceed or not. A chart was also given to us to memorize, detailing at least 4 bits of evidence for each type of road user (other vehicles, pedestrians, cyclists, motorcyclists, driving on mountain roads, etc.)

Driver Psychology & optimism Bias.

Not having a history of crashes does not guarantee that we will not have an accident in the future. There was extensive discussion about the different types of driver psychology and how to avoid being too optimistic while driving.

Avoiding automatism while driving.

Most accidents happen near one's destination and on familiar roads. This was borne out by Mr. Prosenjit Chatterjee of the Kolkata Traffic Police with multiple anecdotal stories from his experiences. We were made aware of avoiding automatism while driving, especially on familiar roads.

Fatigue & ways to cope.

We learnt about the differences between fatigue, drowsiness and microsleep, and how to understand when we need to stop driving to reduce the risk of accidents.

From 1-30 pm to 2-30 pm it was lunch break. Post lunch the focus was on-

Ownership of safety

We were told how to analyse our own driving mistakes in case of crashes as well as near-miss situations, and how to create our own feedback system to prevent repetition of similar incidents in the future.

Emotion & risk taking

This was a general discussion of how our emotional disturbances at home and work increase our risks while driving, and how we can avoid letting our emotional state spoil our own safety while driving.

Commentary Driving

We were taught how to perform commentary driving, which focuses our attention more fully on the road and hazards around us.

Low risk Driving

This was a summary of all the key points to keep in mind when driving using the Low-risk driving method. We were also given a form to enable us to self-assess our own driving quality as well as test our learning in small groups of 4-5 people on the road. We also received reminder stickers with the key points to keep in mind when driving as we were taught.

At the end there was an interactive question & answer session to clear our doubts about the whole course, followed by a small speech by Mr Prosenjit Chatterjee from KTP on his vast experiences, with tips about what to do in various dangerous situations while driving or riding

Few pics from the session.

Dr.Shamindra Sengupta (SS-Traveller) during the training.










Mr Prosenjit Chatterjee sharing his experiences, tips & suggestions.






During an interactive session. From left to right - Bhpian- Delix, burnout, Doctorsmile82, sayata, Arindamxeta, SarbariC with Mr Prosenjit Chatterjee


At the end a certificate was provided to all the participants.


We winded up by 6Pm.

[Samba]

Now, no event is complete without some good food and a bit of fun!

We all enjoyed the excellent food provided by 'Hotel The Sojourn'-





















Special thanks to Bhpian Sarbaric and HokKolorob for arranging this cake as a surprise for all of us.


Signing off as of now, will look forward to attend many more such classes to brush up my driving style. It was a much needed training.

[GTO]

Thread moved from the Assembly Line to the Road Safety Section. Thanks for sharing!

[sandx]

Certainly a well thought out idea and execution. I have attended a lot of trainings for various things but one of this kind I have never come across.

Another one in the list of unique things that bhpians come up with. Wish I could join to.

[BlackPearl]

Great report Samba. I had been trying to arrange this for the last one year but failed to do so. Big thanks to all of you who finally managed to do it. Too bad that I had to miss this one. Maybe next time.

[VeeEight]

Fantastic. Great to see such a good course to have been conducted.
I wish and hope that there will be done in Bangalore too, soon.

Thanks for sharing.

[A.G.The Rambler]

Good to see that this event finally happened. Missed it sorely. Very nice and detailed description Samba. Thanks for sharing.

[riddhiride]

Great to see such events organized by team BHP members in Kolkata. In future can you kindly let us know in the website so that we can also join

[arjab]

Wonderful initiative! Was news about this impending workshop put up on on our forum? Too bad i missed it

[Rahul Bhalgat]

Really good initiative. I appreciate SS-Traveller for organizing the training program and Samba for posting the details.

SS-Traveller, for the benefit of all the members, can you please start a thread on low risk safe driving? Or if you (or anyone else) can organize such training programs in major cities, please share their details with cost.

Is there a program specifically designed for the drivers of trucks?

[Highway_Nation]

Can't thank enough to DBhpian SS-Traveller for conducting this training. The whole perception of driving has changed after attending this training.

[Blooming Flower]

Samba da, fantastic summary is put together of what we have learnt during the training course. It will certainly help all of us including all the readers of Team-Bhp to revisit and re-analyse their driving style and psychology. Dbhpian, SS-Traveller's vast experience in this field helped and is continuously helping all of us hone our driving skill. Looking forward to attending such training if arranged in future.

Originally Posted by BlackPearl

Great report Samba. I had been trying to arrange this for the last one year but failed to do so. Big thanks to all of you who finally managed to do it. Too bad that I had to miss this one. Maybe next time.

Perhaps, you have missed it, but we all definitely missed you and your advice and commentaries from your huge experience in hill driving and OTR sessions. It would have been more interesting to have a formal session from you if you were in Kolkata.

[sarbaric]

It was an eye opening session and am sure if all of us did our small bit and spread our learning, we will have good traffic experience.
Wish such sessions could be arranged for the larger mass

[Sayata]

It was a wonderful event. Cleared a lot of blind spots from our mind as a driver. The best part of the session was, it was very interactive with some real experiences of near miss and avoiding the same was shared by mentor , D-Bhpian SS-Traveller as well as Mr. Prosenjit chatterjee from KOLKATA POLICE.

Managed to click a couple of pics from the feedback section of the trainees -