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I’ve always stuck with the Japanese brand of tires such as Bridgestone or Yokohama. Had the opportunity to try out the popular Hankook RS3s back in AZ. That is about the same time that I had started tracking with NASA AZ. The sidewalls were softer than my previous AD08Rs that I used on the street. Fast forward to relocating back to Atlanta, I came upon a small business called R Compound. Listening to a prior Narita Dog Fight podcast, I heard the owner was a Filipino. Of course, I had to show some support. Anyhow, I tried out a set of Federal RSRRs at the time. They felt pretty good during an autocross outing and on the street. I took them out to Road Atlanta for a J Zilla event. The first few sessions were taken a bit easy just to get reacclimated to the track. Unfortunately, the car understeered coming down into the esses. The car would not turn. I had two options: Try to get the car back on track knowing the tires were already under stress. Just go straight and rejoin the track. I’m sure y’all already knew my answer. Luckily, nothing was damaged and the car took it like a champ.
Over time the car had parts replaced from wear and here we are in 2021. My last track outing was two years ago with Chin Track Days. At that time the car recently received a 370 axle setup and a Nismo GT Pro LSD. Those improvements made a big difference in the handling and reliability since the 370 bearings are beefier than the 350s. After that, the car was just street driven for the most part.
I wanted to write a real review on the Nankangs since there weren’t many reviews on the CR1s. We’ve seen many on the AR1s from Speed Academy and Apex Nurburg. I contacted Duane about getting a set for the Z Nationals track day at Road Atlanta. The car recently was refreshed with a host of parts. New transmission, cam setup, maintenance items since the motor was coming out, and a nice billet oil pump from Boundary. After receiving the tires, I noticed how stiff the sidewalls were just like an RE71 or AD08r. Right off the bat, I knew the tires would have great feedback. That week, the weather was cloudy with a decent chance of rain. The day before the track day, I kept going back and forth between the Michelins and the Nankangs. James at J Zilla told me to go with the Michelins since it was eighty percent chance of rain. I said screw it and threw the Nankangs on.
Friday morning is here and it’s time to make the trek out to Road Atlanta. It was somewhat dry on the way there, but started to rain after the driver’s meeting. The first session was wet so I was driving pretty easy to get everything up to temp as well as feel when the tires started to lose traction. The only time it broke out was coming into turn five. It felt good and predictable. That was a big thing for me is how gradual the slide occurred. Luckily, the clouds started to break apart and the sun started shining. After the track started getting dry, I started to finally push the car. The tires felt pretty good cold. It didn’t need much warm up time to get them warm. Tire pressures were set to 28 before each session. They were anywhere between 31-35 psi when warm. The left tires were on the warmer side since Road Atlanta has more right turns than left. The outer edge of the tires didn’t seem to roll over, which was a good thing. That goes back to how stiff the sidewalls were when trying to flex them by hand. With that stiffness meant it had a very direct feel in the steering wheel. I tried to unstick the car, but they hooked. The tires felt stable going over the curbing at turn three before going down into the esses. They didn’t feel like it upset the car at all. I could feel how the road surface was through the steering wheel with these tires. Every lap inspired confidence. The biggest change that I felt coming out of turn 5 is how the car wanted to track further out to the curbing. Didn’t experience that on the Michelin PS4es. Also, I don’t think I was driving the car hard enough in the past. In terms of audible feedback, you can definitely hear the tires chirp. I’m running headers with the full Tomei exhaust setup so there are a cacophony of noises in the car.
Mounted on wheel look: The tires don't have a lip protector,
which is why I started guessing if I should have went a size up. For those shopping, don't worry. The 275s are good for a 9.5-11 inch wheel according to the Nankang Motorsports site.
Overall, I’m very happy with the tires and hope to add another set or try out the AR1s at some point in time. I was skeptical about trying out Chinese made tires again due to my experience with the Federals, but the Nankangs rock! Thanks R Compound, Duane, and the team for setting me up with a set.
The pics attached are after driving it a few hundred plus miles from the track, back home, and from Carrollton for Z Nationals.
Nankang CR1 Review
