Sim Donuts – IDK S#!t About Drifting

Introduction

Over the years I’ve learned a thing or two about working on cars, but nothing about making them go sideways. I became a fanboy of drifting at 12 years old ever since I watched former FD driver, Tanner Foust, put on an elegant display of car control on an early episode of Top Gear USA. I have been obsessed ever since. I’ve watched countless videos and consumed tons of drifting media but now it’s time to learn. Now at 24 years old, I decided to start where all modern 12-year-olds learn to drive, on a racing simulator.

My goals with the simulator are not to learn how to drift but rather, learn the muscle memory to apply to my first drift event. Because truthfully, I’ve never kicked a clutch.

Setup

Starting out, I strongly suggest just getting a basic setup. No need to spend your whole allowance on a sim rig you MAYBE use once a month. Save your money for your real drift car and just get through the sim door with something affordable. Once you can justify fancy equipment, then you should upgrade. 

Right off the bat, the most expensive equipment is going to be a PC and monitor. If you already have that, then you’re already almost there!

Sim Rig I Use:

Logitech G29

I currently have a used Logitech G29 I found online. I highly recommend checking marketplace for a Logitech sim rig. It’s easy, tons of support and troubleshooting guides. Great starting point. I paid roughly $170 secondhand. Minus the unnecessary handbrake and steering wheel upgrade.

Stand I Use:

VEVOR Racing Stand

I currently use this Vevor stand from Amazon. To be honest, it is a bit wobbly at times but it gets the job done and the price was right. Plus it conveniently folds up so that it is easier to store away. In the future, when I have a more permanent place for sim racing, I will build a better stand.

Game Setup:

After purchasing Assetto Corsa on Steam, you want to unlock the countless mods it has to offer. First download Assetto Content Manager. This is where you will fire up your game with all your mods. Then you will also want to download the custom shaders pack that will allow you to run all the cars you download.

Car Packs:

I recommend downloading the Death Wish Garage car pack. Plenty of stylish cars with ranging HP and wheelbases.

Doing Donuts

To effectively learn how to drift on sim, with hopes to apply it to real life, I recommend you play in 3rd person. At least in the beginning! 3rd person allows a better view of where you are in space, how the car is behaving, and where your wheels are pointed. All things that will help a bunch when starting out. 

I recommend starting in the stock drift map on Assetto and going to this donut circle. Use this circle as a guide to see how well you can go around an object.

Use a car with a 200-350hp range. Although not a prerequisite (but helpful) in the real world, a little bit more power in the sim world will help you break traction a little more consistently which will help when practicing. Too little power can be inconsistent when you are starting out and too much power will be too sensitive.

You want to start with donuts before progressing. Donuts can be boring but are truly fundamental for everything else. Don’t skip steps! Walk before you run. 

For a proper counter steer donut, follow these steps:

1. Turn into the direction you want to go. Either stopped or slightly rolling.
2. Break traction by stomping on gas, or clutch kick (high revs and dumping the clutch). Give enough throttle so the car starts to kick out. Once spinning, let off throttle to avoid a spin out. 
3. Once the car starts to kick out, let go of the steering wheel to allow the car to counter-steer. Essentially the car will point the wheels in the direction of your momentum. 
4. Once you reach a point where the car has counter steer’ed, catch your drift by grabbing the wheel again and getting back on the throttle. Make corrections with steering and throttle input described below.

Final Thoughts

Although you can never replace the real deal, sim drifting is a cost effective and fun way to be involved. I think it teaches fundamental hand eye coordination and muscle memory required to be successful on your first drift event. If you can do donuts in the sim you can do donuts in real life. It’s better to already have that in your back pocket when you go spend real money on a track day and tires. Next time, I’ll show you how that went for me.