Tyres - Premium or Budget?

[Niall]

That's the thing though, why not buy the best tyres you can if you like your car?

There's literally no point spending money on your car be it a visual modification, paint or a remap / performance mod if you skimp on the tyres. They're the last thing between you and the road and will totally transform the way a car handles, even something as simple as a 1.5NAD.

I fitted some Uniroyals on the back of the Mazda Roadster last summer and followed Nick in his Mini down a really fast B-road. The advantage of the Mini was that he didn't need to slow down due to the cars' really low weight, but with those rear tyres on the Mazda it had more grip than power to overcome it, I took an S-bend absolutely flat-out at somewhere above NSL (had an 8 in it...) and the car felt awesome. Two weeks previous to that the car had Toyo T1rs on, which still had plenty of tread but one had a slow puncture. The Toyos never gave me anywhere near the level of confidence the Uniroyals did.

In the end I swapped the crappy Falkens onto the rear axle because they were easier to un-stick on demand, the uniroyals were too sticky and made the car boring to drive.

So you've just answered your own question?