Yep, I was there too, and the car worked extremely well on the skid pad, cones, strip, and did pretty darned good in braking too. And yes, it is hard for some folks to believe, in fact I think Al didn't even believe it for a few days himself! Some of the other virtues that make it such a terrific car in these tests, other than the tires and the very light weight, is the overall aspect ratio of the car. It has a short/modest wheelbase, and is relatively wide, so inherently it has a relatively small weight transfer in cornering. The car rotated perfectly through the cones, it was set up exactly right for that test in particular. I won't ever forget the test driver's responses after he laid down some fast cone sessions, he was blown away by how fast and easy to drive the car was.
And yes, r-compound tires really "do" make a very big difference.
Mark
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