MaxLTV

I had had the new Dunlop Race 2 tires on my 991.2 GT3 RS for 3 track days, all 3 at Laguna Seca, and I am not sure I will continue using them. Here are my impressions:

• Initially, I loved the wear, especially at the front - even across the tire, without tread being pulled to the side, like MPSC2 do sometimes or blistering like P-Zero Corsa 4. I could see them lasting at least 4 days.
• But then the rears wore at the shoulders all the way to the darker/harder rubber that protects the cords on one rear, just after 2.5 rather mild days. Also, in general, wear on rears was more significant that fronts. Could be my car set up. I'm at -2.5 front and -2.4 rear. So I think I could only get 2 days out of them without swapping tires side to side and 3 days swapping them side to side or driving different tracks (e.g., Laguna and Sonoma stress different sides). On MPSC2s I should be abler to get 3 days without swapping, though, so they seem to make more sense.
• The tires are not grippy when cold and take some time to get to grip & temperature. Normally it's not an issue, but with shorter sessions can become a limiting factor. For example, I was starting at P1 for SpeedSF challenge and the warm up lap was way too slow to get any heat in these tires so my first green lap was on cold tires and was throw-away. I could barely stay in front of the car behind me, likely holding it back (sorry to the Speciale driver). And by lap 3 I started lapping Miatas (sorry, Miatas), so I had only 1 fast lap without traffic instead of 2 if the tires had more grip cold, like MPSC2 do.
• Finally, somehow they feel a bit weird. When I drive by feel, I end up underdriving the car (not using all the grip). When I consciously remind myself to drive harder, I end up overdriving the car sometimes and sliding too much. Maybe my brain just calibrated to MPSC2 tires and struggled to recognize the limit as well on Dunlops. But when I tried Corsa 4 tires on GT3, I was immediately faster than MPSC2 by about 0.5s per lap, even though they also feel different from MPSC2.

So I'm torn. I was initially very attracted by their beautiful wear, but that seems to be not holding up to expectations due to rear shoulders wearing through too quickly. Everything else is very minor, but not in their favor either. Anyway, if I could get 4 days out of them, I'd keep using them. At 2-3 days, I do not see the point. Or maybe I should up the rear camber? Of those who tried Dunlop Race 2 ties on .2 RS, what rear camber have you tried?

Mussl Kar

My experience is that they are fine for cars and coffee. Other than that they are schyte.

Smoking Rotors

What were your tire pressures hot?

CRex

Your comments would be consistent with issues related to bringing the tires up to temp gradually and consistently.

There is not one track tire that will work right out of the box from cold. Teams spend an inordinate amount of time+effort fine-tuning their tire temps/pres to hit that window at the right time.

Short run observations aren't really helpful in that you have suboptimal carcass and brake warming to start with, coupled with driver input coming up to speed means you're attempting multivariable calculus on the fly.

Do you think you'd feel differently if you had a 30-minute session and ran the tires as both you (driver) and tires came into their window?

SmokinGTS

I love these tires and have 6 track days on them and will do another next weekend. My lap times have fallen by 2 seconds and the wear is much more even than the Cup 2's where I typically get only 2.5 days from them. Bring them up to temp slowly and these tires will pay dividends. I try for 33F and 35 R hot. Check out Orthojoe's comments on the tire.

mr965

I've had 4 track days on these and still love the even wear and performance/ I've followed Orthojoe's recommendations with good results.

-eztrader-

I've had a few track days with them, and still don't like them. Tonight I ran 29/31 hot - and they felt OK, but not as great as previous Cups. Agree they take forever to warm up, and feel weird. "Finally, somehow they feel a bit weird. When I drive by feel, I end up underdriving the car (not using all the grip). When I consciously remind myself to drive harder, I end up overdriving the car sometimes and sliding too much" sums it up pretty well

orthojoe

All I can say is that "you're doing it wrong"

Those pressures are WAAAY TOO LOW. I run 33/36 hot. If the higher pressures aren't working right for you, that means you aren't getting enough heat into the tire and that running lower pressures is generating the heat for you instead. Not ideal.

If the tires still don't grip, it's because you aren't driving hard enough to get sufficient heat into the tires. You are better off with Cup2s if that is the case because they don't require as much heat.


Max, I always swap tires side to side after a track day. Otherwise, that rear tire outer edge gets toasted quickly. I'm surprised that doesn't happen to you with the cup2s as well. Tire life between the cup2 and dunlops should be the same because of the rear outer edge wear. The real advantage of the dunlops is that the tires are just as fast as they were on day one until that rear outer edge cords, and once you are up to temp, the performance never drops. I would agree with you that the very first session is a throw away session. It takes forever to get the tires up to temp on the first session. After that, though, it should only take 2 laps to get up to speed. My PB laps have been as quick as lap 2 or as late as lap 11.

orthojoe

I will repost what my coach wrote after driving both cup2 and dunlops on a .2 RS. This guy is a retired pro formula driver, so I trust (and agree) with his assessment:


"Cup2s have better single lap time by maybe .1-.25 seconds. They are good for the first 4-5 laps and fall off about 15-20% in performance after that for the rest of the session.

Dunlops take awhile to warm up but handling characteristics do not change they just get faster and faster in session.

Here's my issue for advanced drivers...once tires reach very hot temp, if you have a lot of sessions without a long break they never cool down so if me or you drive cup2s that 4-5 laps of good turns to 2-3 laps for the 3rd, 4th, etc sessions. Whereas the Dunlop's felt good.

Cup2 for PR laptime

Dunlop for fast driver for the full day"

Mech33

I’m not a fan of the Maxx2 either... they “feel weird” to me, too. Hard to put my finger on what it is (feels like excess squirm / soft sidewall), but the result is higher lap times for me than on MPSC2.

signes

Joe is spot on, they need much higher hot pressures than the Cup2 (also confirmed by the Manthey guys).

They are also noticeably softer than the Cup2 and can feel squirmy, not as direct as the Michelin. Doesn't bother me but I can see why it might for others.

dawgdog

I followed Orthojoe's setup recommendations and have been very happy with this tire. Start at 26 front, 27 rear and then adjust to 33 front 35 rear after first sessions. No more checking throughout the day. Lap times are surprising me.

Mussl Kar

I should qualify my statement. Cold day in September and this was at autocross. 70 seconds did nothing to add temp to the tires. In colder weather I usually overdrive the first pert of the course to add some heat. Have never tracked them.

RobertR1

For most of the people here doing track days, not racing, Cup 2's all the way. Track day mentality. Get the 1-2 hot laps while you can before hitting traffic. That's if you're lucky.

My favorite thing going from Cup 1's to Cup 2's was how quick they came upto temp. After the 1st session of the day, I could go full speed at T-Hill by T6 and Sears by the esses. Then you can get your temps right and get your 2 laps in before you're driving around on 680 traffic.

If you want to more laps on Cup 2's like on private day or just get lucky, 2 hot laps followed by 1 cool down lap. If you try to do 4+ at a quick pace, they'll overheat and wear faster also.You'll see an initial pressure spike on the cool down lap but they'll come under control quickly and your'e good to go. However, even with that, they will gradually keep building up and holding temp until you need to come in.

No one racing is doing running cup 2's so they are exactly what they're meant to be. Hot lap champions. Use them as such.

From personal experience, I tried to do back to back, full to empty, runs on Cup 2 at Thill on one of mooty's days back then. I drove through their protest and it absolutely killed their pace. Degraded from pretty calm 55's to very edgy 2:00 during that time.

orthojoe

There's no way Dunlops will get up to temp at an autocross. Definitely the wrong tire for that application.