Heel Toe Shifting - THE Most Important Touge Technique

MODS:
TSRB'S AE86
Tsukuba Fruits Line

Heel toe shifting is an advanced driving technique that is used by racing drivers the world over. It is the art of how to downshift smoothly, whilst keeping the car balanced through the gear changing process. Some of the greatest racing drivers across varying racing disciplines use this technique, and it a skill you should perfect as soon as possible to take your driving to the next level.
In this video, we will be discussing how both heel toe shifting works, why to use it, I’ll be teaching you exactly how to do it. So, make sure you stay tuned, because heel toe shifting is vital if you want to improve your driving.
The heel toe shifting method gets its name from pre-WW2 cars that had the accelerator pedal in a central position in between the clutch to the left and the brake to the right. This meant that drivers were able to use the heel of the right foot to engage the break whilst simultaneously using the toe to operate the accelerator. Nowadays, heel toeing means the opposite.
When performance driving, we must downsift to a lower gear whilst maitaining maximum braking. This must be done smoothly, without upsetting the balance of the car. However, if we simply dropped a gear and let out the clutch while braking heavily, the car would nose-dive, upsetting the balance. Not only this, but it would also try to lock the driving wheels, because of the extra engine braking.
I assume you all know what engine braking is? Well, if not, engine braking is simply the effect of downshifting, and letting the engine slow the car down. This happens as the rear drive wheels start spinning slower than the speed of the car, meaning the downshift almost acts as a brake. This is useful when driving day to day, however, when we’re at the peak rev range, sending it down a mountain at 100mph, the sheer amount of engine braking that would occur one a downshift would make us spin, and maybe even blow up the engine.
Anyway, the smoothest downshifts occur when the engine revs are increased beforehand. This is done by briefly applying, or stabing the accelerator with your right foot. This is what is known as blipping the throttle. This matches the engine rpm with the driving wheel’s rpm, thus resulting in no engine braking. Does that make sense?
You can actually practice these smooth downshifts without needing to heel toe. You just need to be on a straight bit of road, put the clutch in, downshift, blip the throttle and then let the clutch out. With a bit of practice, you’ll get this part easily, and you’ll notice how much smoother each downshift is. Once you get the hang of it, you won’t go back to shifting normally.
However, the tricky part is doing this style of downshift whilst also maximum braking. This requires a technique called heel and toe downshifting. Up next, I’ll be teaching you exactly how to do the heel toe technique.

Here is a step-by-step explanation of how to heel and toe downshift;
Step1. Begin braking, using the ball of your right foot on the brake pedal, while keeping a small portion of the right side of your foot covering the accelerator. However, you should not be pushing it just yet.
Step2. Depress the clutch pedal with your left foot whilst maintaining braking.
Step3. Move the shifter into the next-lower gear, whilst still maintaining braking.
Step4. While continuing braking and with the clutch pedal still depressed, pivot or roll your right foot at the ankle, quickly pushing or blipping the throttle.
Step5. Quickly ease out the clutch, whilst maintaining braking.
Step6. Complete your braking, and enter the corner.

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MY SIM RIG:
▶Fanatec Wheelbase Base
▶Fanatec CSL Elite Wheel
▶Fanatec Shifter
▶Fanatec CSL Elite Loadcell Pedals
▶Fanatec Handbrake

[B_-.-]

I have been doing heel and toe downshifts in racing Sims for years. But, as I've just started driving recently in the real world, I've only just started doing heel and toe in real life. What became second nature to me has once again, become extremely satisfying. It's also genuinely helpful even in normal driving here in the UK, where there's a lot of country roads that'll suddenly go from 30-60. Of course I could engine brake, but I find it easier to slow down smoothly with heal and toe with big speed differences like that.

[williamhayashi]

Takumi wearing racing suit. He finally got the Takahashi’s advices and went pro.
Also: great content as always.

[Cheezus]

I can confirm driving after heel toe really changes how everything feels, car will feel incredible and sound amazing

[Xerra]

The most difficult part imo is getting your foot to pivot without reducing brake pressure with potentiometer brakes, and that cheaper pedals (like the T3PA pedals) would just make your foot or shoe stuck on the bottom of the accelerator. It is a lot tougher than it looks!

[agitatedtofu]

one thing that helped me learn heel toe is doing it in one smooth motion, and to not worry too much about how much blip you give the engine, even in touchier cars as long as you give it enough gas and it isnt done for more than half a second or so, you'll be fine and it takes out some stress of getting it perfect

[ProfessorHoots]

This man is helping me get good at sim racing.

[ymbshinzou]

Really love this series! It captures what makes touge so appealing; the romance of myths and legends combined with the maths and science of going faster.

I was wondering if you would perhaps do a video showing how you might build the specific setups to most accurately represent various stages of Takumi's AE86, the upgrades and tuning to make them perform how you best imagine they would.

For such a mythical car there are really no mods or guides teaching how to build a museum grade replica in AC. Most I've seen are people building these 800hp formula drift versions of it and I know from your slip angle video you know this isn't how his car functioned or handled.

As someone who seems to be the 'Touge guy' around here, I think it'd be a fitting feather in your cap to be the one who built "The closest you'll get to driving Takumi's AE86"

[estimateddeatharrival]

Your videos are so captivating, I have learnt how to succesfully use a mixture of grip and drift in a Touge race to go on and become one of the best Touge racers in phone games . Hats off M8

[mitch]

The hardest part about heel-toe downshifting is not accidentally stabbing the brake when you go to rotate your foot to blip the throttle.

[coyby]

I started implementing double clutching into my heel toe downshifts, over the past 3 years of driving stick I would say that I have fully mastered it.

[tofu]

yellow w red interior has to be the best combination

[Konag_st]

Video? Superb, but oh my god your selection of drum and bass for the background really gets me in the mood. Could you share a playlist or something? My best regards from Spain <3

[JeuneF]

I was actually doing it naturally without knowing this technique, still nice to have more informations about what I’m doing unconsciously 😅

[karl]

Ordered a manual setup for my sim today, so psyched for some heel/toe action!

[kryaal]

Glad to be seeing you more in my recommended vids man, great content <3

[vziuish]

this man just explained this very clearly and i understood what i was doing wrong halfway of the video i really appreciate you for making these videos man

[shultzy]

So underrated, always my go to for learning techniques

[ludo_]

I’ve been doing heel toe downshifts for a few months on sim and once I got my 1990 Miata I’ve been doing rev matching just for fun but yesterday I instinctively did a heel toe downshift it was very weird how natural it felt to do in real life

[Timepeace]

thank you for you videos. i have learned more from you than i did from anyone else

[Nismo_Tyrone]

Man thank you heel toe is my favorite driving downshifting technique