Jason Wittman, MPS (00:03.692)
Hi, Jason Wittman here. Another one of my little podcasts. This one is actually slightly off the subject. Normally we're talking about recovery issues or the getting on living part of recovery after alcohol and drugs no longer an issue. But this time it's totally different.
had a client I was talking to who had some problems with driving and had almost gotten in an accident. And it reminded me of the one useful fact that I learned the one time that I went to driving school.
Jason Wittman, MPS (01:00.022)
Of course I had no reason to go to driving school, but I went, I did. And the one thing I got out of it that has saved me on more than one occasion was what they called the three second rule. Now, when I first took driver ed back in ancient times, truthfully I have been driving
Now, since I'm 16 and I'm 82, so you do the math. When I took driver ed, they talked about being following the car in front of you no closer than it was either two or three car lengths.
In driving school, they said that's really not a very good gauge because the whole reason for having distance between you and the car in front of you is so that if that car should stop short, you have enough time to stop. And the truth is that it can't be measured in car lengths.
because the faster you go, the longer it's gonna take to stop that thousands and thousands of pounds of metal that you're traveling in. So the rule they came up with is the three second rule, which means that you need to be three seconds behind the car in front of you. So three seconds at 30 miles an hour might be.
Jason Wittman, MPS (02:59.406)
100 feet, three, four car lengths, three seconds at 70 miles an hour, could possibly be a block away from the car in front of you. So I learned this lesson and I actually was on, I'm in California, so I was on the 710 freeway and
I was just practicing. And the way to do this, by the way, is if it's in the daytime, the easiest way is when the car in front of you goes under an overpass, the shadow from the overpass is going to hit over his windshield or his back windshield. And when that happens,
start counting. Now three seconds, the easiest way is do 1001, 1002, 1003. Depending on how fast you go, that's probably just slightly over three seconds, but it will work. So.
shadow 1001 1002 1003 at that point it should go the shower should be on my windshield if I beat the shadow that means I'm too close
Is that right? Anyway.
Jason Wittman, MPS (04:47.886)
The shadows shouldn't come until I've gotten past 1,003. So I was practicing this and I was keeping my distance. And if you've ever driven freeways or highways or a New York called parkways, every once in a while, the traffic stops short, wham, from 70 miles an hour to
did stop and that happened. And because I had the proper distance, I started slowing down and looked at my rearview mirror and it turns out that the car behind me was way too close and was really approaching at a speed where he was going to hit me. And I still had time.
because I had enough distance that I could step on the gas and get out of this fool's way.
and then still had time to break and not hit the car in front of me. And the guy behind me just touched my bumper as we came to a stop.
And that convinced me that that's a damn good practice. And every once in a while, that's what I do. Every once in a while, just to check myself, I go and do that 1001, 1002, 1003, and see if I'm actually the correct distance. If you've been driving as long as I have, you're...
Jason Wittman, MPS (06:43.54)
automatically going to be keeping good distance, but it's good every once in while just to do a check. By the way, it occurred to me when I was thinking of presenting this that long before I started to drive, I was driving with my father. I was a passenger and this is on a New York.
Long Island Parkway and Every time somebody went to cut in front of him. He'd let them cut in front of him and My brother and I were starting to needle him on you what you let that guy get in front of you for and He gave me a good lesson I said first of all, this isn't a race second
He was an engineer, a mechanical engineer, and calculated things. And he said that he actually did a study once where he measured the time it took him to get from our house to a place in New York City where we normally went. And he measured that time.
where he didn't let anybody cut in front of him and where every time he let somebody cut in front of him, he backed off a little. And over a 25-mile distance, the difference in time was like two or three minutes. So he said, for safety reasons,
This is long before anyone did any of this safety stuff I just finished talking about. He said for safety reasons, he, when somebody wanted to pass him, he let him. When they wanted to get in front of him, he let him and he backed off a little bit.
Jason Wittman, MPS (09:01.782)
The difference in total time was very, little, and yet he was safer. So the concept was around long before they came up with the three second rule, which was long before they came up with three or four car lengths or whatever they used to say. And so that's it. And I hope this will keep you from getting in an accident.
Please, every once in a while, just check when the shadow hits the car in front of you. Go 1001, 1002, 1003, and the shadow ought not hit your windshield until after you get through 1003. If it does, back off. Now,
A of mine says that his Tesla drives itself and keeps its own distance. It would be interesting to check at what distance it automatically keeps by speed. So I would actually check sometime if you're in a self-driving car.
to do this 1001, 1002, 1003 and see if it actually is giving enough distance so that it doesn't have to slam on the brakes. And that's it for now. I hope this helped and safe driving. Have a wonderful week and that's it. Bye bye.
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