The Art Of Left Foot Braking

If you are not into racing, chances are, the term "left foot braking" would not be in you vocabulary. So what is left foot braking? The term for left foot braking is apply brakes with you left foot.

Back in the good old days when most cars have 3 pedal, we were taught that our left foot is solely for stepping the clutch and our right foot is for accelerator and brake.

Nowadays, automatic transmission comes standard in most cars. You can learn driving with automatic transmission and the road transport minister will issue you a licensed that is under DA.

Source : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Driving_licence_in_Malaysia

The natural progression when driving automatics, then, is to just use our right foot while the left one chills out on the side. But with no clutch to worry about, wouldn't it make sense to use your left foot instead to operate the brakes?

When we park

We all have heard about car accidents where driver initially bumped into another car and then the driver bumped again at a higher impact because the driver panicked and step on the wrong pedal.

When we drive

Driving on the road is very dangerous and split seconds action will determined if we can go home safely to see our loves ones. I personally have experience this number of times where other driver just drive out of the junction or people or animal crossing the road without looking . By slamming the brakes with my left foot, I was able to remove the pedal transition time of my right foot from the throttle to my brakes. It was that split seconds that have made a near miss turns into a fatal accident.

Going up on a steep hill

When we got stuck on traffic that happens to be on a steep hill or a parking building. With your left foot on the brakes and right foot on the throttle, you can control the car movement without having to worry the car will slight backwards. Although, just select D and hold the throttle will do the trick.

Like any good driving technique, mastering left foot braking is a lot easier said than done and should only be attempted after lots of practice. If you've never tried it before, you’ll initially press the pedal far too hard as you’ll be used to the action of pressing a clutch all the way to the floor. It takes time to re-programme the ‘muscle memory’ of your foot and leg. So good luck!!!