r/stickshift

Just bought my first manual transmission car last weekend (2026 Civic Si), and had never driven manual before. I only really stalled the first couple of days while practicing, and was feeling pretty confident after a week, so I decided to take it on a trip up and down a mountain for some more practice.

The mountain itself was fine. It was the parking that was the issue. I ended up parking in a tight spot (only one available) which was also inclined due to the mountain. Definitely scratched underneath the front bumper by giving it too much gas on accident trying to get up into the spot.

The real humbling moment was when I tried to leave. Not only did I forget to turn off the auto-braking system, which made reversing out of the inclined spot way worse, but the spot itself was pretty tight meaning I needed to do a 3 point (or more) turn- so I needed to reverse as much as I could, but not roll back at all when going into 1st again. All the while, by backing up out of the spot, the length of my car mostly blocked the one-way road where a group of people were walking, so they had to wait for me to finish leaving.

My only saving grace was a guy next to me who helped spot for me while I was reversing, before mentioning that he also drives stickshift and could sympathize with me.

Definitely a learning experience...

Hello,

I have been driving manual cars for over 20 years. I recently purchased a manual 24 GTI S. I like the car however the shift experience has been far from ideal. The shifter feels sloppy and plastic like which takes the fun out of driving a manual. Sometimes it's hard to tell which gear the car is in. The dealer claims this is normal. I've driven American, Japanese and German manuals and all are more fun than this GTI.

Does anyone have the same experience? If yes, what can I do about it if anything?

Thank you in advance.

Passed my test last month and learned in a diesel, which I found really easy. I rarely stalled and was comfortable pulling away at junctions, traffic lights, etc.
I’ve now got a petrol car and I’m stalling all the time, especially when I have to stop and move off again. It’s even worse when there are loads of cars behind me because I panic and overthink everything.
Any tips for getting used to a petrol clutch/throttle and stopping myself from stalling? I’m really struggling

So where I’m from first of all learning on automatic and doing the test on automatic gets you a license with restriction to drive only automatic cars, and i’m considering learning manual to release that restriction but i’m not entirely sure because we don’t have many manual cars so i don’t know if its worth doing those few lessons now.

Little off topic, but I got a newer car with automatic highbeams and you'd think it would be convenient but it just pisses me off, I think I hate something doing highbeams for me as much as something shifting for me, it just never gets it right.