My S is my daily driver so all-season driveability is important to me. It will probably see spirited driving and/or Auto-X once a month in the nice months. So I am getting a 2nd set of wheels and I figure I have two choices.

1) One set of soft summer tires and One set of winter performance tires

2) One set of high performance all seasons and one set of really soft summer/race tires

I figure w/ option 2 I'll save a lot of tread wear but give up traction on all the days I have the all-seasons.

Any comments?

 

What kind of climate are you in?

 

East Coast/Mid-Atlantic. Just south of Baltimore. Hot summers, cold icy winters. Worst of both worlds

 

If you can do it, get three sets- all season, SO2's, and R compounds.

If you look around, sometimes you can find deals on stock wheels.

 

AP1 or AP2? I'm running Azenis RT-615's for summers and Michelin X-Ice's for the winter mounted on a set of 16 inch "Fox 5" wheels from Tire Rack.





You can get a 3rd set for R compounds, but how are you going to get them to the autocross? Only way is to put a hitch on the car and tow them (or of course drive on them). To keep you in A-stock, you can run a tire like the Azenis, which has tons of grip for autocrossing and are cheap enough to replace them when needed (you can get all 4 for less than $500).

 

All-Season tires do NOT mean the best of all worlds. They are mediocre at best in ALL conditions. Not great at any one thing, but not terrible either. Good for passenger cars. Sports cars deserve better.

I'd recommend that you stick with the stock Potenza S-02 or perhaps go for the Goodyear GSD3. The Goodyears provide 98+% of the S-02's dry grip and SUBSTANTIALLY more wet grip than any other performance tire in the category. A little cheaper as well.

Go Blizzaks or similar for the cold months.

 

You can run R comps in A-Stock. They created the ST classes to counter this. Minimum treadwear must be 140 for an ST class.

 

I've got those exact rims for my winter tires. I'm in your area - i am running summer tires on my OEM rims and a set of winter tires (Dunlops) on aftermarket 16s. If you get another set of rims, I would definitely recommend slapping winter tires on one set. You won't regret it when it snows.

 

Ok, I'll get winters and try to find some summers w/ Ok treadwear till I can afford a 3rd set of wheels.