Our sport, since the introduction of the R compound tire, has been at the mercy
of the tire manufacturers who want to participate/market to our group.
Yokahama came, left and is now back. General was here for a while. BFG came
and went. Kumho and Hoosier fight for the sales to our competitors with Kumho
having the price advantage and Hoosier having the tire of choice. Pirelli and
Michelin are here, but don't seem to making much impact at the
National/Divisional level. And Falken tailor made a tire for the STS class
that from what I have been told, offers 80-90% of the grip of an R radial, at
half the price for some sizes.
We buy these tires so we can be competitive with others that have them. Even
if we are not a National level competitor, we like to know that we can drive on
the same tires and perhaps win regional event, or finish with a trophy at a
divisional since, or save or street tires from abuse-I don't know. Will STS
survice if the Azenis suddenly is priced at $200? I don't have that answer. I
do know that our unargueably fun sport will continue with the newest iteration
of tires/cars/shocks/"fill-in-the-blank" because it is just that, FUN. Is that
not the reason we all started doing this?
My 2 cents...
Jason
>ST is a "add on crap" class, but it's also built on sand and could
singlehandedly be made a LOT less desirable by a determined tire company.
All one has to do, is make a treadwear 140 tire that is a dry-tire only that
costs $200/tire or so. That will require the 2nd set of wheels and the tire
cost will eclipse that of Hoosier AS's. At that point, there ceases to be an
advantage of having the street tire requirement.
_______________________________________________
Join Excite! - http://www.excite.com
The most personalized portal on the Web!
/// unsubscribe/change address requests to majordomo@autox.team.net or try
/// http://www.team.net/mailman/listinfo
/// Partial archives at http://www.team.net/archive
|