irham hadi answers:

Much of what you should do will depend on class rules and where you plan to complete… But some general comments:

First off, where to look for performance: The single biggest thing you can do to improve your performance is how you drive. This may sound silly, but in my years of instructing intermediate and advanced students, I often find many of them have completely lost focus on this aspect. So if you haven’t already, spend the time to check out some driving books (Hank Watts’ Secrets Of Solo Racing remains the best of the AX specific books, and a good overall driving book; Skip Barber’s Going Faster is also an important read, and I’ve found Bentley’s Speed Secrets to be valuable for intermediate to advanced drivers as a way or presenting things in a new light and often going a little deeper). Additionally, see if you can’t get some of the faster drivers at your events to give you a ride or ride along with you. Likewise, if doing coursework, pay extra close attention to what they are doing when they drive (look for the brake lights, listen for throttle, etc).

Also, for self investment, don’t discount the effects of good driving gloves and shoes.

But for the car? The single biggest performance factor will be the tires. Nothing else you can do will begin to come close to what you can get from the tires. A soft compound slick will be the best, followed by the Hoosier AX tire, then some of the other Hoosier style DOT tires. Then on to other R-Comps. Then the current class of “cheater” street tires. And then on to the aggressive street performance tires. If you are changing tires at the event, consider the Hoosier style and above.

After tires, the next best thing is getting the car setup with an appropriate alignment and corner balancing and dialing in the correct tire pressures. With the AWD on your car limiting how much you can stagger your tire sizes, special care with the pressures will be important in helping to minimize understeer.

Next would be anti-roll bars. Again, with your car, adjustable bars would be the best choice so you can better tune your balance. After that, springs and dampers. And then weight… And lastly engine and power.

What you are missing here would be brakes… Because braking in AX is never much of an issue unless your car has some major braking problem. If you are also tracking your car this is something you’ll look at, but keep in mind that many things you will do to make the car‘s brakes more track appropriate will hurt in your AX performance. Track pads need to be hot to work, and you’ll never get that kind of heat into them during an AX. Bigger calipers and rotors can have a positive effect on lap times around the track, but are just added unsprung weight on an AX car. Are you having problems with your brakes? If not, make sure you are using pads designed for street use! Ate Blue or similar fluids are always good, but again, I cannot imagine ever being in danger of boiling any brake fluid at an autocross.

So, specifics: If you are getting wheels and new tires. Go with the lightest wheels you can get since this will be saving unsprung rotating mass and saving here can have a very nice effect on all aspects of the car‘s performance. In terms of tires, Michelin radial slicks in the blue compound seem to be the best at the moment, although like any dedicated race tire they will never get up to temp. Any soft compound bias ply slick would be next. Either of these though will have major classing implications, so be aware! After that would be the Hoosier A6, followed by the Kuhmo V710. The V710 is a good value choice, and also seems to work at much wider slip angles than the Hoosier. But for sheer pace in the hands of a good driver, the Hoosier is the top for a DOT tire.

If you are going with a street tire, the “cheater” tires would represent the sweet spot: Bridgestone RE11, Dunlop Z1, or the Kuhmo XS. Dunlop coming in as the bargain choice with the Kuhmo being the quickest (the Bridgestone is probably the best all around for all conditions).

That and some adjustable anti-roll bars would give you a good basis to start (along with getting a more aggressive alignment and corner balancing). After that, consider that the stock seats in your car are probably around 50# each, and most likely not as supportive as you’d like… And so on.

Just to add, if you’ve just started, don’t get too far ahead of yourself. Coming back to the earlier point about investing in the driver: faster tires take more skill to drive quickly and will break away quicker and with less warning. If you are not already getting everything or at least a lot of your car‘s potential, making it faster can quickly become a crutch that will limit your driving ability.