WHEN learning anything new you get to a stage where you can do it seamlessly.

This in many ways is a good thing, but if you're learning to drive and trying to learn a specific thing you can't keep doing the same old route.

You don't learn anything new and when you get to do 'real' driving you're left to cope with loads of new things all the time, so its good practice to learn how to do this and gain that valuable experience behind the wheel.

Mine came when on the way down to the old A1. We entered a side road near Knaresborough where we changed so I could drive.

I did not know this road but I've seen the entrance many times so I had no idea what lies ahead - of course normally if you're going somewhere new it's that way anyway.

Recently I've had a little problem shifting down gears, it's not yet become second nature to me, but on this drive I did not accidentally go into a too low or too high a gear until I got into a village where there's an uphill road with a bend right before it.

At this time I was in a too high a gear and I had a car very close to my bumper. I accidentally went into fourth when aiming for second, this caused me to quickly change gear.

I annoyingly shifted first causing me to lose too much power and as I could not change again, due to me focusing on not stalling, I had to wait until I got to a place where I could shift up to second.

Thankfully for the rest of the journey there was no more near calamities.

I carried on until I got onto my old route, from here it was just making sure my changing of gears and turning was carried out flowingly so making them easier and less likely to cause problems.