I was really looking forward to the "Is Bigger Better?" article on tires. It's a question that I have pondered since my A Mod days. It's a question that I am still pondering for the $Challenge car. Do we slap on the steamrollers or is a bit smaller size actually faster? Maybe it comes up to temp faster or would be better suited to the weight? Don't know. After reading the Downsizer article I was left a bit "Meh". It wasn't a size comparison. It was an aspect ratio comparison with only two tires - 40 and 45 ratios. That's like comparing 95 cents to a dollar. How much difference could there be? There wasn't much. What answers did we get? The biggest difference seems to have been price. Maybe in a future article progressively larger footprint tires could be fitted to a car to find out at what point bigger is actually slower. Work in the same overall diameter range with increasingly wider rims and footprint. As an example: A base Miata is 205/50-16. Is 225/45-17 faster? Probably. How about 245/40-17? What about 265/35-18? At some point the car will be slower or harder to drive. The results could help to actually answer the question "Is Bigger Better?"
