He Said- By Elliot Hunt
When it comes to cars there are primarily two flavors—automatic transmission and the much more feared manual transmission. I prefer to think of the stick-drivers like myself as part of an elite underground group of drivers who have tamed the daunting beast for the good of society, but the reality of the matter is that stick-shift isn’t that hard to learn. It’s more than just an opportunity that so rarely presents itself for people in modern society. Case in point, the photo editor here at The Branding Iron, Farren Thompson, and I ventured out in my vehicle of choice, a 1968 Volkswagen Beetle, for a crash course in manual transmission.
We started out simply—I laid out the basic concepts for her, such as how the clutch serves to connect and disconnect the engine to and from the wheels. Before long she was synthesizing her own thoughts and actions in the car—driving figure eights, stopping, shifting up, shifting down, parking and doing everything one would normally do with a four-speed. For her, the mystery and fear were shattered. I would have fully trusted her to drive me home that day—after just two hours of learning.
With every person I’ve taught to drive stick shift, I’ve done my best to convince them how much better it is. When you buy an automatic transmission-equipped car, you’re paying extra for the convenience of it—and that’s about it. It both uses more gas and has a more expensive initial purchase price—in both used and new cars. In the same way, when you eat fast food you’re paying for someone to hand you pre-cooked food, again, for your convenience. It’s not as cheap or as healthy as the food you make yourself, but it’s definitely more convenient.
She Said – By Farren Thompson
The first thing you should know about me: I am the kind of person that any new opportunity, technical or creative, I approach with great excitement and a desire to master a new craft. Having said that, Elliot’s plan to teach me how to drive manual filled me with an unfamiliar anxiety.
The morning of the lesson I was filled with thoughts of doubt in my own abilities. I was going to be driving someone else’s vehicle. What if I hit something? What if I was completely inept at learning this new skill?
Spoiler alert: this was not my first time attempting to learn this gypsy magic of stick shift. I know that all the anxiety I felt going into this was because of a less than ideal first attempt full of car stalling and close crash scenarios.
Elliot knocked on my door around 11:15 a.m. and off we went to our track of choice: the Staples parking lot.
After several minutes of demonstrations and a futile attempt to postpone the inevitable death scenario I envisioned, Elliot got out of the drivers seat and I became first in command.
After our first ten minutes of slow figure eights and reversing practice my anxiety had vanished.
Soon after, not to toot my own horn, my anxiety was quickly replaced with a sense of triumph. I had learned, and demonstrated, the correct ratio of clutch to brake and smooth shifting from first to second gear. I soon got braver with the speed of my turns and even decided to do a U-turn without instruction! Mind you, we probably never exceeded 15 mph, I was Evel Knievel.
Needless to say, round two of ‘Teach Farren to Drive Stick’ was definitely more of a success than round one. I owe 100 percent of this to Elliot. His patience and passion about manual transmission greatly impacted the way I approached this new venture.
Adding in tid-bits of information throughout our entire excursion, I learned quite a bit from Elliot the benefits that a manual transmission can provide as well as the unique inner workings of ‘Lola’ our trusty Volkswagen beetle. My inner researcher enjoyed this part of the experience just as much as the actual driving portion.
I look forward to furthering my manual driving abilities after this second attempt and owe it all to my helpful, patient and knowledgeable teacher, Elliot.
