Everyone's definition of a sports car is different I guess. I'll answer like this: For similar money, one can choose a GT-R, a Z06, an Exige, a Cayman S or older 911 variant, and several others.
The GT-R starts at $90k now. I don't know about the Exige, but the Z06 starts at $75k while the Cayman S starts at $62k so they are well below the GT-R in price so its not surprising that there are a few more, not to mention that they are all fantastic.
The GT-R just doesn't have the feeling of control the way the others do. It would be an exaggeration to say you're just a passenger when you drive it, but if a car can lean in that direction, the GT-R does. That seems to make a lot of difference to the guys that have taken up road course driving as a sport.
I guess I just don't have enough experience to know what you mean. I can understand numb steering, oversteer, understeer, mushy brakes, sloppy suspension and all that. But if you can get in a car, whatever it is, and it performs really...really.... well, I'm not sure what the value is to that 'feel' unless it is fun or nostalgia. I'm not knocking it, I think I'd prefer the more 'involved' vehicle as well, but it seems like more of a sentimental thing that a true performance thing. Anyway, I'm just thinking out loud and don't really know what I'm talking about.......but I have watched a LOT of Top Gear!
I guess the closest thing in my experience is trying to horse my coupe around a bit and being frustrated by the car's systems. You really have to do a high rev clutch dump to smoke the tires and you're as likely to get wheel hop as a burn out. I could easily smoke the tires in my older, lower HP trucks and SUVs.
On my car I use Pagid RS14 brake pads. They're pretty much full race pads. Pagid makes their RS4-2 pads, which are excellent as a street/track pad in my experience. Don't know if they make a fitment for your car. Other popular street/track pads around the track are EBC Yellowstuff and Hawk HP Plus. Be advised any of these is going to dust more than your OEM pads and may be a bit noisier too.
I'll look into the Pagid RS4-2 pads. I've researched the EBC Yellowstuff pads and have been leaning that way. They seem to be a reasonable compromise for a daily driver luxury coupe/would-be track day car.:laughing:
It already has very lightweight forged rims but future plans include adjustable shocks/struts and beefier adjustable antisway bars...but trying to resist dumping too much money into making this a mediocre track car when I should be saving for a 2010 Cayman S with maybe 40k miles on it to be purchased in 2013.:drool:
Don't worry about your tires at all. A new driver isn't going to do much damage to them in his first weekend. If you decide you love it and are going to come back to do it again and again, then of course your tire wear will begin to increase and there isn't much you can do about it. You just accept the idea of buying expensive tires a lot more often than you used to.
Thanks for that advice. It has summer high performance tires on it but their a bit harder than most of the super pricey tires. Still not cheap though. But you're right, I suspect I'll spend most of any track day learning technique rather than pushing any limits.