Obstacles in the fast lane...

Greetings to you this Monday Morning
I was in Mumbai for the weekend and last evening drove down to Pune along with some of my colleagues. It was a wonderful evening and as usual the Mumbai-Pune expressway offered a wonderful stretch of road for those who enjoy long distance driving. The expressway is a 100 km, 6 lane concrete highway on which one can comfortably cruise at 80 kms/hrs for most of the journey.
However, one stretch of the road is more difficult. As you cross the Khalapur tollbooth and start towards Lonavala, the road offers a steep upclimb, narrows down and has a lot of twists and turns that are required to navigate the Western Ghats.
As you try to maintain a reasonable speed on this stretch, the situation is further made difficult by large multi axle vehicles, which drive in the fast lane. These large vehicles create an obstacle in the fast lane and no amount of honking or light flashing is going to help. They simply do not budge. Those of you who enjoy long distance driving will agree with me that a better strategy in such situations is to slow down, change gears and fall back. This offers you two advantages, the lower gear gives you an ability to accelerate at the right moment and falling back gives you the ability to study the obstacle in the right perspective. Sooner or later the road will offer you an opportunity to get past the obstacle, and you will need the additional power to accelerate and skillfully maneuver your car past the obstacle.
Same is true in other situations. No matter what you are doing, once you hit a sticky obstacle, it may be a better idea to change your strategy. Rather than persisting with brute force, slow time a little and give yourself some more energy. In most cases where brute force does not work, a combination of agility and flexibility will work.
-- Sudhanshu Pandit (Oct 11, 2004)
Have a great week!