Heat: Pedal to the Metal
Manage speed, gears and engine heat through corners as up to six cars race across four tracks, with solo Legends and a championship system in the base box.
Choose a gear, play that many speed cards and move your car around the circuit while managing corners and slipstreaming.
Heat lets you boost or absorb stress from hard driving, but spent Heat enters the deck and must later be cooled out. The base box also includes solo Legends and championship play.
Why We Love It
Heat makes speed management more important than simply playing the highest cards. Corners punish excessive speed, while Heat cards are both a resource for pushing the car and a burden that clogs the hand.
About Heat: Pedal to the Metal
Choose a gear, play that many speed cards and move your car around the circuit while managing corners and slipstreaming.
Heat lets you boost or absorb stress from hard driving, but spent Heat enters the deck and must later be cooled out. The base box also includes solo Legends and championship play.
Game at a Glance
Choose a Gear
Your gear determines how many speed cards you must commit.
Respect Corners
Entering a corner too fast forces Heat and can create major problems.
Spend and Cool Heat
Use Heat for aggressive driving, then manage it back out of the hand.
Race the Whole Track
Positioning, slipstreaming and timing matter across the full circuit.
What is Heat: Pedal to the Metal?
Heat: Pedal to the Metal is a racing game by Asger Harding Granerud and Daniel Skjold Pedersen. Players manage a personal deck of Speed, Heat and Stress cards while shifting gears and trying to clear corners faster than rivals.
The base box includes four tracks, Championship rules and automated Legend drivers for solo or filled-out races.
How the game works
Each round begins by choosing a gear, which determines how many cards you play. Your selected Speed cards set how far the car moves, while special effects, slipstreaming and boosts can change the result.
Corners impose speed limits. Exceeding a corner’s limit adds Heat to your hand/deck system; pushing too hard without enough available Heat can lead to a spinout. Cooling and gear management determine how aggressively you can drive later.
The decisions that define it
The core tension is whether to spend Heat now for position or preserve it for a later straight or decisive corner. A fast line through one section can create a weak hand for the next.
Positioning also changes the value of slipstreaming: sometimes being just behind another car before movement is more useful than leading too early.
Who is it for?
Choose Heat if your group wants an accessible race with simultaneous planning, visible position battles and enough card management to reward repeat play.
It supports solo and larger groups better than most games currently in our archive.
Learn Heat in depth
Heat expansions
Compare all Heat expansions · Heavy Rain · Tunnel Vision · Rocky Roads · Legends
Focused Heat rules
Compare Heat
Publisher sources & scope
Checked September 15, 2026. This is a researched base-game hub. Expansion and card-specific exceptions remain governed by the publisher rules.