3rd is by far the best and my fav but I do not have any troubles with 1-2 after getting used to it. I got my 04 with 20k on it and I had the pop out happen a hand full of times in the 20-40k range (even with a dec build date) but im almost at 70k now and never happened again. The best suggestion I can give is to pull down with pressure to the left (kind of like a 5-4 downshift).