I have about 15K on the Potenzas (crap), but It seems that the more the tires wear the better I can launch...comments?

 

Well if you think about it, the more they wear the less tread there is, the more rubber is directly touching the ground. Kinda like slicks, which means good handling in dry conditions and horrible handling in wet conditions. Either that...or your tires are weird...

 

Well....Not really. Most tread blocks (including the RE040's) are the same size all the way to the tread base (i.e., they don't get wider as you move from the top to the base), so as they wear, you're not actually putting more rubber on the road. What a shorter tread block does mean is less flexing and stretching of the tread blocks under load, which translates into less energy absorbed by the tire, meaning crisper power transfer to the ground.

The negative of this is that as the tread blocks get shorter, they have less ability to "absorb" load forces, so your road-holding ability actually diminishes.

 

As a tire ages the overall diameter of the tire is reduced, thereby making the tire easier to turn? I bet you're getting better.

 

Some tire are made with multiple compounds, hard at first and softer as they wear. This is done to compensate for the loss of tire performance as they wear down, particularly in wet conditions. Typically a tire performs worse as it wears, so you can compensate by having a softer compound near the tread base. Perhaps this is the case?