They took my tires away. One day after I fell in love with them, Kumho announced that we all had to return our ECSTA V710 tires. A lot of folks got a little upset because the tires were that good. Then when they told us that we would get two sets of tires for each set of ECSTA V710 we returned, the whining stopped. Kumho demonstrated that they knew how to handle a really difficult situation.
Kumho and Tire Rack (who sells most of the Kumho competition tires) took a very difficult situation and turned it into a positive one. That's not the easiest thing to do. It seems that this latest and greatest DOT-approved track tire had a small problem. Because of what appears to have been a manufacturing defect, the tread would fly off the tire during competition. That's not a good thing.
Once it became apparent that this was no isolated incident, Tire Rack and Kumho went into recall mode. If you owned a set of the V710 tires, you were asked to return them as soon as possible, and they would ship you a set of V700 tires (the previous generation of track tire). Then, as soon as the manufacturing problems were resolved, you would get a brand-new set of V710s.
This solution even got positive comments on all the Internet forums, which can be brutal on products. When was the last time you saw anything this positive on a forum?
"I just got home from an appointment, and FedEx had delivered my stack of replacement Ecsta V700s, shaved and heat-cycled, just as requested. From decision time to product-in-hand-in 48 hours... This has to be unprecedented in the racing-consumables world. I am downright impressed."
"It is very refreshing to see Kumho with this attitude when other tire companies in the past have denied even having a problem!"
If you really want to go fast, you need real sticky tires. A few years back, a couple F1 teams analyzed their records with some fairly complex multivariate analysis programs. After examining several years worth of on-track experience, it turned out that tires were by far the most significant factor in going fast. Tires made even more difference in lap times than the driver.
When the Corvette lost at LeMans in 2003, the first thing Pratt and Miller did was dump most of the drivers. Then they dumped Goodyear. This year the Corvette races on Michelin tires. The Corvette, after 50 years, is now running on French tires. That's how important tires are for going fast.
Track events are where a club rents the racetrack for a day, and we all get to drive fast around this track. It's not racing. I call it driving around. We all attempt to be as fast as real racers and convince ourselves that we're pretty good at driving. A good day is when you pass a couple of cars and don't break your Corvette doing it. The big difference is that track events are a whole lot cheaper than real racing. You can drive your daily Corvette on the track. There's no need for a race car. Just use your daily driver.
If you've never driven your Corvette totally flat out for a half-hour, you really need to take it to a track event. Driving on the street is one thing. Going flat-out for an extended period is a different world; a world you need to experience. After a year of driving fast, you'll begin to think the only thing holding you back are the Corvette street tires. You'll want sticky tires just like real race cars have.
For the last few years, we've really had two choices in tires. Hoosiers have always been the fast tire. Kumho has always been the value tire. The new Kumho V710 changed that old adage.