Help With Timing

Hey... Anyway below I have pasted an excerpt from my in-progress racing game (sorta).
I was trying to use time.h to have it where the opponent's car would move after 1 second regardless if the user has moved or not, but that's the problem. The opponent only moves after you move, so I would like to know how could I make the opponent's car keep on moving even if I haven't moved my car.

Also I included the whole code (in case you want to look at it).

Code:

unsigned int c;              //For arrow keys.

char lane[16];

const char blnk = ' ';
const char ucar = '>';
const char ocar = '<';

lane[0] = ucar;
lane[1] = blnk;
lane[2] = blnk;
lane[3] = blnk;
lane[4] = blnk;
lane[5] = blnk;
lane[6] = blnk;
lane[7] = blnk;
lane[8] = blnk;
lane[9] = blnk;
lane[10] = blnk;
lane[11] = blnk;
lane[12] = blnk;
lane[13] = blnk;
lane[14] = blnk;
lane[15] = blnk;

int a = 15;                   //For opponents car to move.
       
while(1){
         
      cout<<"\n\
      ================\n\
      "<<lane[0]<<" "<<lane[1]<<" "<<lane[2]<<" "<<lane[3]<<" "<<lane[4]<<" "<<lane[5]<<" "<<lane[6]<<" "<<lane[7]<<"\n\
      ----------------\n\
      "<<lane[8]<<" "<<lane[9]<<" "<<lane[10]<<" "<<lane[11]<<" "<<lane[12]<<" "<<lane[13]<<" "<<lane[14]<<" "<<lane[15]<<"\n\
      ================\
      \n\n";
      
      time(&start_time);
      
      time(&cur_time);
      
      lane[a] = ocar;
      
      lane[a + 1] = blnk;
      
    a--;
           
           if (a < 0){
                 a = 15;
           }
     /* 
      if ( ( time(&cur_time) - time(&start_time) ) != 1){
           
      lane[a] = ocar;
      
      lane[a + 1] = blnk;
      
      a--;
           
           if (a < 0){
                 a = 15;
           }
      }
      
*/
      
      c = getch();

       if (c == 72 || c == 77){ //Up & Right - In Order
       
                if (lane [8] = ucar){
                lane[8] = blnk;
                lane[0] = ucar;
                }
                
       }
       
       else if (c == 80 || c == 75){ //Down & Left - In Order
       
                if (lane [0] = ucar){
                lane[0] = blnk;
                lane[8] = ucar;
                }
                
       }
       
       clrscr();
       
}

Thanks for any help,
~BW

Use kbhit() to check if any keys have been pressed. You can use it like this:

Code:

if ( kbhit() )
{
	// check what keys have been hit
}

THANKS VERY MUCH!

Seriously this will help me out a lot in this and other stuff.

But now I feel stupid over such a simple solution...

But yeah, thanks again.