There are different ways to steer the steering wheel, including:
- Palming – A one-hand steering technique where you press your left palm onto the wheel to turn it round and round
- Hand over hand – A two-handed technique where one hand may cross over the other hand when needed
- Shuffle steering – This entails your left hand staying on the left side of the wheel, and the right hand on the right side.
To be clear, each one of the steering methods has it place. There is not one that is better than the other. The most important thing is to NOT lock your hands on the wheel and to keep them moving when needed using any of the methods.
Today, we’ll be going over shuffle steering. Shuffle steering is not only safe, but it’s also a very effective steering method, especially if you’re operating a car without power steering.
Hand Position for Shuffle Steering
An important consideration when steering a car is hand position related to the air bag. If you get into an accident and have your hands and arms in front of the airbag, the airbag will deploy and force your hand/arm to hit your face anywhere from 60 to 186 miles an hour. With shuffle steering, neither arm nor hand should ever cross the air bag in the center of your steering wheel.
So, for shuffle steering, make sure your hands are at 8 and 4 o’clock. Your left hand should stay on the left half of the wheel and your right hand on the right half of the wheel. Imagine an imaginary line going from 12 o’clock to 6 o’clock. So, the highest your hands can go is where both hands are at 12 o’clock (your hands touch their index fingers together). The lowest both hands can go is 6 o’clock (where your hands touch their pinkies together).
How to Steer Using the Shuffle Steering Technique
To steer, simply shuffle the wheel from one hand to the other. When you turn right, your right hand should be pulling down on the wheel. When you turn left, your left hand should be the one pulling down on the wheel. If you “run out of wheel” (the right hand hit edge of its legal range of motion [6 o’clock]), the left hand can grab the wheel to keep it from turning, and you slide the right hand up, grab the wheel again, relax the left, and then continue pulling down with the right.
Check out our demonstration video below:
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