Speed Secrets: Use a 3-Legged Stool to Sense the Limits

Your left foot is the third leg of a 3-legged stool

When sitting in your car, think of your left foot as the third leg of a stool. The other two legs are your right foot and your butt.

To sense what your car is doing you need all three legs on the “floor.”

I’ve written about the importance of keeping the heel of your right foot on the floor while working the gas and brake pedals (I’ll get to left-foot braking, shortly). If you lift your heel off the floor while modulating the gas and brake pedals, it’s like a stool trying to balance on two legs. You soak up a lot of information about what your car is doing with that foot and leg, especially if it’s on the floor.

Your butt in the seat is another leg of the stool, and critical to sensing your car and the track. Keeping it in contact with the seat is relatively easy, but the more it’s in the seat, rather than on the seat, the better. So, squish your butt back and into the seat.

The third leg of the car-sensing stool is your left foot. At least, it should be. A common error I see drivers make is not placing — bracing — their left foot on the dead pedal (the rest pad to the left of the pedals). And many of those drivers are surprised when someone makes them aware that their left foot is hovering just above either the clutch or brake pedal, or that sometimes it’s tucked back near the front of the seat.