The differences between driving in NASCAR and Australian Supercars are aplenty. For instance, NASCAR drivers use their left foot for braking while Supercars drivers typically use their right. Will Brown, the defending Supercars champion, is someone who moved from left-foot braking to right-foot braking while in Australia. In a recent interview, he lauded the braking technique of fellow journeyman Shane van Gisbergen.
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Like SVG, Brown hopes to become a mainstay in the NASCAR scene. He made his Cup Series debut at Sonoma in 2024 and will be racing in the ongoing season as well. He admitted that it was the influence of automotive businessman Roland Dane that made him switch his braking foot.
Dane is the co-founder of Triple Eight Race Engineering, the team that Brown races for in Australia. He said, “He sort of recognized me and we were going through looking at how I could get a contract with them and he said ‘I won’t take you onboard unless you right-foot brake.'” Left-foot braking in Supercars is pretty rare to come by.
But Brown believes that the one driver who has got it perfectly over the past decade is Fabian Coulthard. From there, he went on to shower praise on van Gisbergen. “But pretty much everyone over there is right-foot braking, heel-and-toeing, and doing that. Shane just does a really good job at how he modulates the clutch,” Brown continued.
The heel-and-toe technique involves using the heel of the right foot to nick the throttle while using the toes to brake. This matches the engine speed to the gear changes during downshifts. Unlike the Cup Series, Supercars have retained the clutch pedal and use a manual transmission. This is why right-foot braking is more prevalent.
When asked about the difference in using the clutch while braking in Australian Supercars and NASCAR, Brown said, “I still think you can use it a bit in these (NASCAR) cars. I have been looking at a lot of footage from last year of different guys at Chicago and you really hear when they go for the down change, the rears start chattering.
“Hopefully, which at Sonoma, I felt like you could modulate that a bit, if you can try to prevent that from happening and use the clutch to modulate that if you feel that it is locking rears, then it just allows you to have more stability in the corner.”
This Sunday, Brown and van Gisbergen will go against each other for the first time since the 2023 Adelaide 500, with the Chicago Street Course having the honor of matching these two heroes.
Interestingly, van Gisbergen was the spotter for Brown during his debut at Sonoma last year. But this time around, he won’t be providing him any help. SVG told NASCAR, “I actually spotted for him when he raced Sonoma last year, so I was trying to help him a bit. But this year, there’s no help because we’re competitors.”
Brown will be racing for Kaulig Racing this time. Hopefully, he will have a better outing than he did with Richard Childress Racing in 2024, when he finished 31st after suffering electrical issues in his car.
