300 runs? Wow that's impressive. How would you character your driving performance. Are you top of class mid pack etc.

Surprised? Look at national tour autoX results and you'll know why the RE71 is the top of the spear.

I did pretty well in autocross last year with my rival s'. I get a 50% discount off bridgestones now so I can't wait to try the re71rs which is the current hotness. Maybe bridgestone will make a newly revised version of the re71r like bfg did with the rivals.

That's a fantastic discount you get there! :thumbsup:
I've always had a hookup on car parts (usually cost), but I've never had a plug for tires.

I say surprised bc I don't really follow autocross. Its just something car related to do in between track days. The only people that usually beat me are two s2000s that compete on a national level and they both use dunlop z2s.

I thinks its a combo of things. Out pavement isn't that grippy. I'm really good at not over driving the car. Car is light and well setup.

Driving this year started off around mid pack and got much better but half way through the year. I have beaten people the this year and in previous year have trophied in STX at nats. Also have been in the top 10 PAX in a region that brought back more trophies from nats with the exception of a CA region.

I hope to make it out to nats this year, but life thing may not allow for that this year.

I was on ZII SS last year; I think they were better at the track (thought a bit squeely) than at autox; where I was the only one running them. I'm not good enough for them to have affected my performance too much. I'm stuck with them this year as my budget calls for making it through two seasons with a tire.

I'd love to try the RE71 - but will they carry their performance to the track?

I can say they were easy to keep in a good temp range at autox and that they survived me being very rough on them.

For me, decent life is 7.5 months of street driving (18,000 km), 4 HDPE track days and 60 AutoX runs per season. I'd like to get 2 seasons.

In terms of where I sit, I'm top 30% PAX and mid-pack in STX. Top guys here are running 245 wide RS3's on KW's (no 71R's yet because Canada availability was shotty) where I'm 1 ish seconds back on 225 RE-11A's

Moving from CS to STX this coming season, to 245/40/17 on 17x9. Debating between ZII Star Spec or Ventus RS3. Any thoughts?

I'm leaning towards ZII Star Spec because our autox events have a wide range of temperatures through the season (40-90+ degrees F), and I heard they are better in the cold.

I'll also be daily driving these tires (through spring, summer, late fall) so I feel the ZII Star Spec might be better for slightly more wet grip. I attend about 12-15 autox events per year. Any ideas?

The star specs are significantly better for autocross but usually cost more; however, both are second tier tires to the Bridgestone Re71's.

Most of this discussion has been directed to autocross performance.

What about HPDE performance? I have run RS3 for the past two seasons (V1 in 2014, V2 in 2015). I love the cost. They can be stretched to last my full season of about 20 days.

Any reason for me to switch to 71R or Rival S? My understanding is that the 71R will be faster, but will be much more peakey (i.e. only good for a few laps). Rival S?

For the cost, I still think RS3 is the right choice for me. Tell me why I'm wrong.

Thanks.

I wouldn't call them peakey for HPDE. My best time of the day was on the last lap (lap 9) of my last session. See below, third from the top BW:

http://s34.photobucket.com/user/ae86...jpeg.html?o=15

In my experience last year, you will be at a disadvantage with the RS3's to the R71's. A friend and I have comparable cars, he had the Bridgestones, I had the Hankooks. While he is a slightly better driver, I know I could have run closer to him if I had the Bridgestones. ON similar tires our times are much closer. I probably could have gained 1-2 seconds on 60-90 sec courses. IF you plan to compete at a high level get the Bridgestones, if you want more tire life get the Hankooks.

Well, that's not the topic of the thread.

But I agree, for HPDE duty I'd be looking at RS3 and ZIISS, the durability combined with HPDE being non-competitive the 71R/BFGRS don't make sense until more data is available.

If you have the money to gamble on the new hotness or are running your HPDE's in a competitive manner and can shrug off the cost of having to replace them earlier than expected it's probably worth the gamble to try something new, sometimes that's half the fun.

:burnrubber: