In this guide, I will teach you all the main things you need to know about to make your life easier instead of being confused and not having any help. I will also teach you All of my techniques and ways of how I drift, to try and explain and make you a better drifter. Now, before I explain to you the basics, please note that everything takes time and practice, if you know that drifting is your thing and you want to learn but make mistakes at times, do not worry, everyone makes mistakes.
I’ve spent about a total of 50+ hours teaching my self how to drift. No it wasn’t easy, yes, I didn’t know what I was doing at first, but as I am a quick learner, I managed to quickly teach myself to drift, and then it became much bigger, I was able to transition, go around the track quicker and all around just be a better drifter. What I’m trying to say is, You should never give up doing what you love.
The Basics
Here are the main basics of learning to drift
Drifting may seem hard at the beginning, but trust me it is worth it.
Where do I start?
The first step to drifting in games such as Assetto Corsa, is you want to make sure you have a steering wheel. Any wheel is fine as long as it supports a proper H-shifter or a sequential will do.
The wheel I am using/started with is a Logitech G920, which you can use as a starter.
When buying a Steering rig, make sure you actually get the peddles that come with a clutch, this will be needed so that you can clutch kick, for cases like, needing to rev up as the rpm’s may be too low, or to kick the rear end out that small extra bit.
Once all that has been taken care of, we can now go to the next step.
The next step
Is actually getting the game you want to actually practice on, in this case we are using Assetto Corsa. Now, for a game to practice on, I would mainly choose Assetto as it is one of the closest games to irl drifting.
Now for the next step
Once you’re in the game you want to practice on, you may need to setup the wheel, peddles and shifter so they are all usable, because by default, it is only really set to keyboard and mouse.
Changing some of these settings may be a bit hard at first, but once you get a feel for things and know what works best for you is where you can properly start drifting.
Now, it took me a while to get my settings right for me but in the end, it was all worth it.
Don’t just try one thing and say that it is the best for you, actually go into the settings and mess with them for a bit and try to see what works best.
Once all that has been completed, we can now go to the next step
Now, you’re probably thinking, what car should I practice in.
Any car is fine as long as it has enough power to spin the rear wheels and get you sideways.Each car has different handling, this may be a little bit confusing at first but you will get use to it.
First, Make sure you’re not in a high powered car, as using a high powered car in the beginning may make it a lot harder to learn about how the cars work and what they’re capable of.
Once you’ve picked the car, you are going to want to start on, any map.
In this case, I would just go onto the map called drift. We can download more later on but this is the main one for learning.
Now here’s where you actually learn to drift
Take a few laps around the track and get a feel of the car with your steering wheel to make sure everything is right. Once you know it is all good, this is where you can start drifting.
Now don’t go all crazy and instantly think you can do it straight away, a lot more than that goes into drifting.
What you want to do is come up to a corner, at a good speed, depending on the car, I would do about 50-60 km/h and also depending on the turn.
If the turn is a long and wide turn, you can choose to go more faster, rip the handbrake and then go into the turn and start counter steering, which is one way of drifting, but you don’t want to be using your handbrake all the time as, not only does it slow you down a little but it also ruins your drift, if you do it mid drift.
Which is why when you come up to a turn, you will want to come out a little then go towards the turn and then rip the handbrake, which will bring the rear of the car out.
Practice doing that a few times and then you can start the next step.
This is where it gets a little bit harder
Once you’ve learnt to do the entry, now you can practice countersteering, now to do this, you are going to want to do the entry move that I explained earlier, once that has been done you can now let go of the steering wheel but keep your hands close to it as you are going to need to catch it, let it go around until it looks like the car is just about to start steering the opposite way, instead of leaving it in the one position, you are going to, counter steer, to do this you will try to do slight adjustments with the wheel, depending on how much angle you are at, for example, if you are facing to far in, try steering all the way to the opposite side you are facing, and if your feel like your aren’t getting enough angle, there are a few ways you can fix that, the first one is by using the handbrake but that really isn’t what you want to do, what we are going to do is try steer towards the turn a little more but not too much, and we are also going to apply a bit more throttle when we are doing this, which is where the next step comes in.
Throttle is a big thing with drifting
It isn’t just about the counter steering and the entries, it is also about how you use the peddles, for example when coming up to a turn you may want to use your brakes to slow down a little, but don’t use your handbrake to slow down as that is only to bring the rear of the car out more.
Learning throttle, braking and clutching, aren’t the easiest of things, but it is worth learning.
If you’re just about to switch gears, make sure to clutch in just before you do it, then you switch to the next gear, or to the lower gear. This is also needed for things like takeoffs on the spot, handbrake entries, low rpm’s and many other cases.
One thing you want to make sure of is that you are not trying to be a crazy driver and go to fast, you’re actually going to want to slow down just before a turn, and then use the handbrake, this will also stop you from coming into the turn to fast, causing you to spin out, miss the turn, or go to wide.
Enough of that stuff, now you’re still needing help with the throttle, try to get a feel for the car, dont constently sit on the throttle, what you actually want to do is, if your car is not getting enough angle, not only turn in a little bit more but also try using a little bit more throttle, as it causes the rear wheels to spin quicker, meaning the rear end of the car will flick out more, and to do this if you are getting to much angle, it is pretty much the opposite, just use less throttle, counter steer opposite to the turn more, and you should be able to hold the drift after that.
Now, with all of these basic steps, you should be able to start drifting for the first time.
Yes, I know reading this may of taken a bit of your time, but trust me, it is worth reading this rather then just going in without actually knowing what to do.