If you're planning on using your car on the track, you could find that a tyre upgrade is the single best use of your cash. Good tyres will improve lap times, increase levels of safety and make your car lose traction more progressively on the limit.
General advice
Never have different tyres or tyres with different levels of wear on the same axle, this is a sure fire way of adversely affecting your handling. Why give yourself a disadvantage from the start?
It's best practice to fit the newest tyres to the axle which needs the most grip. If you have a front wheel drive car this will usually be the front axle unless your car has a tendency to oversteer, in which case the rear wheels could probably benefit from the most grip. Rear wheel drive cars should generally have the newest tyres at the back to prevent oversteer and minimise wheelspin under power.
Tyre compounds
The compound of a tyre describes the blend of materials used in the construction. Tyres are full of nature's goodness - rubber, carbon and oil and it's the proportions of these which determine the properties of the finished tyre.
Choosing a tyre compound is a matter of compromise, and you need to think about the type of events and / or road use you're planning on putting your four wheeled machine through.
Hard
Harder compounds are useful because they wear relatively slowly, but provide less grip then softer varieties. We don't need to go into the science here, but it involves.....
If you're planning on using your car for road use and a few track days, then perhaps the softest compounds aren't for you. If you're getting 10,000 miles between replacements then you've hit roughly the right balance.
Soft
Soft compound rubber provides the best grip in the dry, heats up to operating temperature fast but wears quickly. Soft compounds are also used in winter tyres as this allows them to have a lower optimum operating temperature. Chose a soft compound if you're car is a dedicated track machine, or if you have the luxury of a road and a track set of wheels. For longer events such as 24 hour races, it might be worth opting for a slightly harder compound so you don't need to pull into the pits every 20 minutes.
Tread patterns
Slicks
Slicks are essentially tyres with very little or no tread, this provides ultimate grip in the dry but can be considerably worse than a general purpose tyre in the wet. Most slicks are also illegal on the roads so only consider this option if you're putting the car onto a trailer after use.
Wet tyres
Dedicated wet tyres have a tread pattern specifically designed to clear water as fast as possible, provide maximum grip and reduce the chances of aquaplaning. Wet tyres often have a directional tread which can help prevent aquaplaning when competing in the rain.
General purpose / intermediate
Unless you want to carry two sets of wheels and tyres with you to the track, your best bet is to use a good set of general purpose tyres. This will allow you to drive legally on the road and provide a decent compromise in wet and dry conditions.
Directional tread
The tread pattern on these tyres optimised for one direction of rotation. You can recognise directional tyres by the arrow shaped grooves pointing in the direction of wheel rotation. The primary advantage is the increased ability to clear water and resist aquaplaning, especially at higher speeds. In dry conditions, the added benefit of directional versus standard tread patterns is much reduced.
Asymmetric tread
Asymmetric tyres have a different pattern on the inside and outside and are usually only used in high performance vehicles. The inner side tends to have more grooves to help with water dispersal, while the outer edge has stiffer tread blocks with less tread patterning to provide enhanced cornering performance. Asymmetric tyres must only be used in one direction or they can actually compromise handling.
Competition and tyre choice
Planning on competing? Regulation books can be a lengthy read but there will almost certainly be tyre specifications for almost every class of competitive racing. Make sure you aren't disqualified for using rubber which us too sticky for the event, you can guarantee your competitors will notice even if the scrutineers don't!
Pressures
Determining the best pressures for a particular tyre on a particular track in particular conditions takes experience and experimentation. The rule of thumb is to start with the tyre manufacturer's recommended pressures, then adjust according to how the car is behaving. If your having trouble with understeer, try reducing the front tyre pressures by a few psi to provide more grip at the front end. The opposite is the case for oversteer - letting some out of the back will provide more grip and stop the back coming out so easily. Only ever increase or decrease the pressure by a few psi, the more air you let out of put in, the less effective the tweaks become.
Tyre reviews
Do you have experience with a particular tyre? Please let us know how they perform using the form below.
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Yokohama |
| Tyre make | A048 |
| Review | An excellent semi-slick tyre with decent water clearing ability. Very predictable on the limit and excellent grip, especially in the dry. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | An excellent semi-slick tyre with decent water clearing ability. Very predictable on the limit and excellent grip, especially in the dry. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 5 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Yokohama |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Very good semi-slick for the dry, normal grip during wet. Silica compound. Grip level is max on dry tarmac. Ui-directional so rotation needs tyre to be taken off the rims. I would continue to use it again. This is not drift tyre but once it is worn to 20% or less thread, wet performance will drop dramatically to "1" which means it will slide in rain a lot. But if dry, grip of worn tyre will like a normal tyre. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Toyo |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Best R compound ever tried. Very grippy in the dry and moderate in the wet, recommended to pair it with good wet rubber like Eagle F1 GDS3 so rear won't flip. Tread wear is not as good as other performance rubber but it will survive in hot climate as well as raining roads |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Falken |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Great tyre when dry. Good on the wet tarmac. Horrible in the snow. Even though it is an "All-Season", I consider it to be a summer tyre because of its poor traction in the snow. Because this tyre is extremely affordable, it is great for drifting. Not recommended for casual road use because the road noise from tyres is extremely loud. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 3 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Kumho |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Background: Average everyday driving with little bit of "attitude" (cornering, take-offs). No track or any other racing. Recently put my second set of Kumho Solus. Quite softish compound. The best grip on wet I've ever had in this car (Toyota Avalon). Previous sets were: Michelin Vivacy and Hankook (don't remember model). Wet grip was there still until very last moments of tyres life! |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
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| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Goodyear |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Fantastic tyre, grip levels are awesome, cant get my Audi S3 to lose traction with these on. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 5 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Yokohama |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Good tyres in terms of performance. But the noise level is awful. BTW should there be Noise level comment somewhere here? This tyre is realy loud :( prob due to low profile as well. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Toyo |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | A very good tyre on the track. I've been using these tyres both on the road and on the track. Very good tyre on the road (stay hard), and on the track, it comes really soft after 2-3 min of warming up. Very good grip on cornering. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
| Reviewer name | |
| Tyre manufacturer | Dunlop |
| Tyre make | |
| Review | Great tire, surprisingly good grip in the wet for a semi-slick tire. Its a pretty soft compound so it doesn't last too long. Its not a quite tire, road noise is there, and loud on some types of pavement, but its totally livable, there is no deafening tread howl. |
| Dry performance | |
| Wet performance | |
| Road use | |
| Track use | |
| Durability | |
| Overall rating | 4 |
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