TYres?

I ran Avon ZZ1s on road and track and found the grip fine. Not limpet-like, but they were extemely progressive on the limit, and took alot of miles & abuse on track easily. Compared to Eagle F1s which end up a gloopy heavily-worn blob after 60-70 miles of the same track driving - better grip from the F1s though.

I've ordered P-Zero Rosso Asymetricos to replace the F1s. I've had good experiences with Pirelli before. Again, not mind-boggling grip like say Yokahama, but so much more progressive when they do leave go that they're alot nicer.  

I was underwhelmed by Bridgestone on road and track, but found that they maintained the performance over the magority of their lifetime, unlike others.

Khumo, Nokian, Federal, Champiro etc are all budget/economy brand tyres so don't confuse them with premium brand tyres. Federal (not as good as what people like to believe they are) and Khumo (decent tyre for the price) are popular budget choices.  Firestone (subsidary of Bridgstone) and BF Goodrich (subsidary of Michelin) aren't bad in general but I woul not use their high performance tyres on any half decent sports car as they can't deliver the levels of performance required.

However, we stock Falken in bulk and sell them at roughly £5-10 more than the cost of a budget tyre and these are our best sellers and they are premium tyres.  They have a very high tread wear reating, a very high temperature and traction rating and are phenominal for the price (at which we sell them for anyway).    

Also, I would say look at Goodyear Eagle F1 (not that expensive compared to its main rivals but an awesome tyre, I have always used this for the past 8 years!!), Prielli P-Zero Assimetrico (expensive but amazing! I run my 328i and C70 T5 GT on this, doesn't last as long but simply amazing).  If you are like myself where you will spare no expense on tyres, then you generally can't go wrong with the following;

Falken FK451 & FK452, Goodyear Eagle F1 GSD2/3, Michelin Pilot Sport, Michelin Pilot Exalto, Continental Sport Contact 1 & 3, Pirelli P7000, Pirelli P-Zero Assimetrico, Dunlop Sport Maxx, Dunlop SP9000 (we have a regular E39 M5 owner who always has Dunlop Sp9000 fitted on his car and has never had a bad word to say about them, he does the odd trackday in it as well). 

Bridgestone's can be good but they tend to suit different cars if you know what I mean and generally have very stiff side walls which in my opinion is a bit OTT and annoys me for everyday use.

I have used Avons in the past and hated them most people do. Not great in the dry and awful in the wet (We don't even stock Avons, only get them in if a customer asks for them, and theres not any demand for them in general).  Yokohama are good enough in the dry, the grip is there but I'd prefer more feedback from them, and in the wet they tend to be quite dissapointing.  

Also, don't think that www. has the best offers on tyres, if you phone around you'll find that you are likely to get a better supplied & fitted deal.  We are an official fitter for a online tyre retailer (can't say which one due to legal reasons) and we have about 40 customers p/mnth sent to us, most usually enquire how much we could have supplied the tyres to them for, and we are usually cheaper in most cases.  Only once in a while we may be beaten if the online retailer is doing a hughe special/clearance offer in conjunction with its distributor.

I've got the falken 452's on mine (225/45/16)  and I'm very happy with them.  Excellent wet weater grip, good dry grip, and pretty hard weaering.  Sure for track work I'd go for somethign softer, but as a high performance road tyre, I'm very impressed.

They behaved pretty well on track too. 

www.falkentyres.co.uk are the importers IIRC.  by my local tyre man got them for me for £75 all in.  bargain!

I use Goodyear Eagle F1's get on really well with them , there much better than the Avons i had before

cheers

Andy

p.s got them from Blackcircles.com who were very good on price