How To Guide for
Heel-Toe Braking
By Stuart Jones
stuart.jones@funb.com
Here's my technique for Heel-Toe Breaking.
For demonstration purposes, it might be easier to visualize this using your hands.
 | 1) Both hands out. Left hand is at 10:30, fingers resting on the dead pedal, palm
in-line with clutch. Right is at 1:00, fingers tipped in towards the front of the car,
palm mid-way between throttle and brake.
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| 2) Time to start braking and shifting. Right hand comes up off of throttle and rotates
up to vertical, then to 11:30 & hits the brakes. Left hand comes vertical and
depresses clutch. Take the car out of gear.
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| 3) Left hand off of clutch. Rotate right hand around the axis of the fingers; you should
be hitting the throttle somewhere along the innermost bone of the pinky finger. Listen to
how good the engine sounds. Go on, take your time about it if you want. Hit the throttle
again a couple of times. Think of how cool this must look & sound to someone watching
from outside the car. |
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| 4) Left hand back onto clutch and grab the appropriate gear. Undo that funky rotation of
the right hand. Left hand begins coming off of the clutch. If you time this last step
right, when you fully release the clutch pedal, the engine will be slowing from the 'blip'
and naturally settle on the proper revs for the gear & speed. |
At this point, you can either:
| a) continue braking and do the whole thing again to downshift another gear
or |
| b) get hard back on the gas and set up for the next corner. |
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As a sort of disclaimer, I'll note that, while this technique is a lot more complicated
and convoluted than the classic technique, it works for me given the teeny confines of the
Miata's footbox.. My natural driving position is fairly close to the wheel/dash (more so
than most people my height: 5' 11"), so I don't have much clearance under the
steering wheel to move my feet around. As a consequence, this is the best I can do without
professional instruction, which might be a good idea. :)
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| Hope this verbosity helps you find a way that works for
you. And hey, if your coworkers see you trying to pantomime along with the instructions,
maybe you'll get a couple of laughs too.
-Stu |
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Here are some more thoughts from another
Miata owner
Read the heal and toe procedure by Stuart Jones. This is the method I was originally taught by my dad years ago. Worked pretty good on my 1st car; a'51 Plymouth with 3-on-the-tree. But it had lots of room in the footwell and the gas pedal was placed quite a bit lower than the brake. A few years later I got a '71 Corvette. Didn't work quite as well as the toe end of my foot would get hung up on things above the brake pedal.
Later a friend of mine described a different method he was taught at a racing school. This method involves using the edges of your foot and pivoting your foot side to side. You place the edge of your foot on the brake while simultaneously placing the right edge of you foot on the accelerator. You apply pressure to the brake while rocking your foot to the right to blip the throttle.
It takes a little longer to get the hang of it than the "old" method but, once you get smooth you'll find it takes much less effort. It requires no contortion of the foot and lower leg at all. This method seems to work better on cars with the pedals pretty much on the same vertical plane, as most cars are now days.
I got a 10 Anniversary Edition Miata and love it!. The "new" method works well with it. Although, it would help if the pedals were a little closer together. You do have to be careful to get your foot accurately placed so as to not slip of the brake.
Regards,
Ken Wolff |
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