Toyota Repair: Corolla 5-Speed Starting Difficulties, technical bulletins, floormat

Question
Ted,

I recently purchased a new 2004 Corolla LE with a manual 5-speeed transmission.  I have to press down unusually hard on the clutch to start the car.  It's a bit of a hassle and am concerned that I won't be able to start the car quickly if it stalls in an intersection. The Toyota dealer service dept. said that this has been a characteristic of the Corollas for several years, but did not have an answer for why in the world they would do this.  They also said it could not be adjusted.  Do you have any advice regarding this?  Thank you.

Harvey  

Answer
I've never heard of this being a normal condition, I also checked to see if there are any technical bulletins for this and there are none, a common problem is that there may be a floormat installed that won't let the clutch pedal go all the way down to depress the switch.