How To Do A Burnout – Manual Transmission

Doing a burnout is a key part of any drag race. Even though most experts will caution against doing a big smoky burnout in a car with street tires on it, as that actually reduces traction, you should so a short one to clean the tire off and make sure you optimize the contact patch. Doing this in an automatic-equipped car is as simple as holding the gas and stabbing the gas hard enough to get the rear tires spinning.

However, the process isn’t quite as simple in a manual transmission-equipped car is a little more complicated, requiring some practice to learn and refine. One of our favorite YouTube channels, Engineering Explained, took some time to put together this video about doing a three-pedal burnout and also did some thermal camera footage to see just how hot the tires get and how quickly they dissipate heat after the burnout.

If you have a manual car and you’re thinking about heading to the track to run it, go ahead and watch this video for a quick tutorial and then go make a few passes with this newfound knowledge of the burnout process!