Full Test: 2006 Mazda MX-5

[giant_mtb]

You know what they say about big fe...well...nevermind.    

[SJ_GTI]

I'm always surprised when I hear people say they can't drive stick or know someone that can't. Its really easy...just takes a small bit of practise. Everyone in my family can drive a stick (even though only two of us actually have our cars with manuals).

But compared to something like ice-skating or roller-blading driving a stick is a no-brainer.

[MX793]

I'm always surprised when I hear people say they can't drive stick or know someone that can't. Its really easy...just takes a small bit of practise. Everyone in my family can drive a stick (even though only two of us actually have our cars with manuals).

But compared to something like ice-skating or roller-blading driving a stick is a no-brainer.

A lot of it depends on when you were born, I think.  For instance, I don't think I've met someone from the baby boomer generation or older who doesn't know how to drive a manual transmission.  They all, at least at some point in their lives, know how to drive a stick.  However, by the 1980s, the automatic gearbox was really the new "standard" transmission and a lot of people just stopped learning how to drive stick and most driver's education classes stopped bothering to teach it.  When I took driver's ed in the late 90s, the extent of manual transmission instruction consisted of part of a class period using the manual mode in the simulators.  There was no hands on manual driving (and the sims were pretty bad at simulating a stick shift).  If somebody went into that class not knowing how to drive a stick, they certainly didn't walk out with the know-how to jump in a manual equipped vehicle and drive off.

[Raghavan]

I'm always surprised when I hear people say they can't drive stick or know someone that can't. Its really easy...just takes a small bit of practise. Everyone in my family can drive a stick (even though only two of us actually have our cars with manuals).

But compared to something like ice-skating or roller-blading driving a stick is a no-brainer.

People who can't drive a stick either don't want to learn how or don't have the opportunity to learn.