Question:
NOT a good school, terrible equipment & not enough behind the wheel time but still going OK & I'm catching everything fairly quickly except that friggin alley back. Strange, I can do the serpentine back with no problem but can't seem to catch the hang of hitting the hole on that alley dock!!!!
Anybody have any tips or words of wisdom???

Answer:
90% of backing is properly setting up the truck for the backing. The right angles and positions of the tractor and trailer will make backing a lot easier.
Bottom line is that the only way you learn how to back up is to back up. It just takes time. I probably have gone backwards farther than some newbies have forward and I still screw up at times. Relax. Get out of the truck (grab a smoke or a breath of fresh air) and calm down. Walk around and picture in your mind where you want the trailer to go and how to get it there. Take your time.
You can do it. Just don't go through a lot of mental gymnastics. We have all been where you are and one day we discovered we could back up.
Practice, practice, practice.Sometimes you have to dig through a lot horsesh#t to find the pony.

Answer:
Learn from your mistakes
when you mess up. Set the brakes and get out and look (GOAL) at the truck and the dock and see what you did and what would fix your situation.
Do the same thing as your backing get out and look see whats going on out of the truck as your backing..
When ever you dont know whats happeing outside the truck GOAL. it will (edited) some guys off but will make the guy your backing beside very happy when you dont hit his truck.

Answer:

That's a strange manuever, if they're doing it the way I was taught. What I did was get the cab 45 degrees to the trailer on the first cut, then cut it back the other way (quickly!!!) until the cab was 45 degrees in the other direction.
From there it was pretty much a standard angle back, and pretty much luck as to how you were set up at that point. If you can do it with one pull up, I wouldn't sweat it much more than that.

Answer:

Fuel cuts into the profit. Turn the problems over to Swift, JB, Celadon, Werner, etc.______
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I'd rather die on my feet like a man than live on my azz hiding in a truck.........Sir James Brown

Answer:
Well. getting a bit better I guess. Or maybe my mood was just different today. Who knows, but managed to put it in 3 times in a row without too much trouble and once (1st time) on the first try with no pull up. Still think it's going to be my sticking point so practice, practice, practice.......
Thanks for the pointers and encouragement.

Answer:

I'm the king of the pull-up and I've been doing this for awhile. On the other hand, I don't get paid for going backwards so I don't much worry about it.

Answer:
shiftingears,there are some days even the most experienced drivers have a hard time hitting the hole without a "few" pull ups,then some days everything just falls into place and u can back in with no problems,like it was said earlier,just take your time and you'll get the hang of it