Give Me A Yank, Please

To The Axle

The Redneck Games were in full effect in Surfside over the weekend.  I sat and watched people getting stuck in the sand over and over.  It was even more comical to see one stuck then someone try to go around them in the same area only to get stuck too.  At one point, there were three vehicles stuck in the same area.  As I was rolling down the beach in the truck, I saw a man walking toward me and noticed a van stuck in the background.  He asked me to give him a hand.  I could tell by looking that there was little to no chance I could pull him out as he was buried up past the rear axle.  I gave it a shot anyway to no avail.  He just kept spinning the rear tires while I pulled.  I asked him to put it in neutral to see if I could just pull him out. That too was a bust.  His rear axle was so buried that I was not even sure a wrecker, short of a big rig wrecker, was gonna be able to get him out.

Loss of traction is what got the guy at the beach stuck in the sand.  Rather than slow down a little when he felt the tires spinning, he floored it.  If he would have put the van in park, got out and dung some of the sand away from the rear tires for about 10 feet, he would have made it through it.  More power is not always the answer.

Traction is a delicate balance of working the accelerator relative to the driving surface.  Think about watching racing highlights on television.  One of the main reasons for accidents is loss of traction.  That can be caused by track conditions, bumping, or overpowering the track with too much accelerator.

The same thing happens in some of the situations we deal with in life.  We begin to lose a little traction.  Some attempt to power through it and that might be the answer for that said event.  Other times, flooring it will just get you stuck in the sand.  There are other times where we lose traction and the rear end starts coming around.  We have to steer into the event or we end up spinning in circles and ultimately into the wall or the ditch.  You have to use skill and adapt to the situation. Spinning your wheels all the time either has you buying new tires or getting stuck up to the axle.