The worst that came of my RT660s was a weird linear "crack" forming across the width of the tire which I presume is from the manufacturing process for tread lamination where the two ends meat. Granted I only ever auto crossed mine, hadn't taken my car to the track yet.

I love the RE71RS however as the car does more track duty I'm looking for a slightly longer lasting tire. I usually buy my set at the beginning of the year when there's a $100 rebate. Last year I got ~300 track minutes and ~70 auto X runs with total ~4000 miles out of a set of RE71RS before I hit the wear bar, which honestly isn't bad. However maybe a combination of personal improvement and track conditions I absolutely shredded my RE71RS at my last outing at Gateway, which is a roval. Banked high speed left hand turn and overall rough surface so I went through way more tread than I was expecting.

Looking at V730 or CRS next. I really want to try V730 however it's pretty much a slick after one day and I'm hesitant about wet since I still street drive to the track. Then again in my experience RE71RS aren't that great in the wet either unless you have full tread. I just remember the last down poor I had to drive through and the car felt like it was hydroplaning anywhere above 50 on the highway.

 

My 660's were almost 100% track use.

A052's are fast but only for a lap or two on track. They get greasy too fast. They are great for autox as you want a tire that does great even when cool so they have been at the pointy end there. During hot events though you have to spray them a lot, even on a light car. I ran them on track just for a standing start shootout once. Start from standstill on pit out and make one timed lap. We got 12 runs of that but plenty of sitting time in between. So the yokes did great for that. I did spray them a few times though. I would not use them for HPDE as you will wear them out super fast and spend a lot of money on them. Even for autox they wear very fast. They are an expensive tire to run for sure.

I like the new RE71RS right now. I have only autocrossed them so far though as my track season has been on hold for now for other reasons. The previous version wore too fast for being good for HPDE IMO. But that has been resolved with the new ones I think and they will at least do better in rain than the 730 some other choices I think.

I went out in the wet on the 730's once last year. Pretty much just slow seat time. They were slippery as hell and thus did not put a lot of confidence in them for an HPDE in the wet. But session 2 was mostly dry and 3 was dry so had good sessions for those.

 

Add my vote for the V730 as well. I'm currently on the CRS, and while it's a good tire, I wasn't as wowed by it as I was expecting I would be. For me doing mostly lapping with a sprinkling of time attack here and there, I don't think the price differential between the v730 and CRS is worth it when weighted with performance and wear rates.

I've driven the v730 in the rain. It's fine, just don't drive through standing puddles of water, and don't be dumb.

Main topic:
Curious about how the RT660 does being run backwards. In theory, it's a symetrical directional tire, and shouldn't matter in the dry - haven't done it myself to see if the theory holds up in practice.

 

Hey hey...no opinions from people in SoCal about anything that has to do with rain or inclement weather. I believe that's a law.

 

Here is the tire wear, for everyone's reference.
The RH tires (especially RR) has way more tread than the left side.

The grip is long gone...but the tread persists. So, as mentioned, I will burn these down and just try harder to drive faster before buying new ones.

 

Hell practically new !

But yeah, nowhere near to the worry point or near cording. I am the same way in that even when a tire cycles out it is very hard for me to just swap them. I used to use tires like that at practice autox events when I lived up in MN. We could easily get 50 runs in a day plus some car whoring so it was a good way to finish off tires!

 

Even having lived in MN and now in MO, out of 7 years of doing track days I think I have had 2 evets that were wet. And both times, it was drying out and dry by 2nd session. Knock on wood! But for just HPDE I put up with tires that were not great in the wet. If I am doing something competitive that is different though.

 

hahaha. Point taken, but to be fair, the last two rain seasons we've received 28 and 26 inches of rain versus the annual average of 14". Drove the v730 in both of those seasons. Also, recently drove the CRS through a light sprinkling of snow (didn't stick to ground though, melted immediately on contact with road) - the 5 FWY will sometimes get snow in the winter, and prime track months for setting PBs is Dec-Feb.

Anyway, get an asymetrical tire for your next tire so you can cross rotate instead of just moving front-rear.

 

I have driven to events and autocrossed on RE-71's and A052s in snow before ... that was interesting. Early and late MN motorsports season gets dicey sometimes

 

Yep! I'm definitely interested in A symmetrical, reasonably water friendly tires next round.

A few years ago, I stored my S2000 all winter at another location because I was renting somewhere with a 1 car garage.

At the end of April, I finally got the conditions I wanted in order to bring the car home. The rain all month had washed off *all* the salt from the roads, and the forecast showed clear skies, with improving weather thru the week.

The weather isn't reliably un-snowy until the end of May, but I figured I could at least get the car home because the forecast showed sun for the day.

Nope. In the 25 min drive home, the skies opened up and we got like 2" of slush for no reason. The car was on RE71R's.

I had to drive slowly enough not to die, but swiftly enough to get home before the salt trucks made it out. I can still say the car has never seen salt.

RE71R's were snow tires that day.