Tire: Potenza RE97AS
Category: Grand Touring All-Season
UTQG (treadwear): 400 A A / 480 A A
The Potenza RE97AS represents Bridgestone's thrust into the luxury and touring market for coupes, sedans, and sporty crossover vehicles. So this tire has been designed to provide a bit more sport to the grand touring all-season tire segment and should even perform well with a small amount of snow on the ground. So as you can imagine, this tire shows up with a high grip and silica tread which should allow this tire to also have some good wear characteristics. The RE97AS also has internal twin steel belts that have been reinforced, and wrapped in nylon thus improving durability and saving weight. Less rolling resistance equals better fuel economy and acceleration, braking, and cornering.
While Bridestone really talks up the Potenza RE97 book, the reviews from drivers don't exactly back that up. With this being a relatively new entrant into the market, I can't say that gives me a lot of comfort. I think in general, people have found this tire to just be adequate and have not exactly found the performance aspect equal to the billing. That being said, in no way would I say this tire is "bad", it's just that for a newer tire, one would expect more standout performance. Drivers seem to think that these will do well in most situations, but their snow ability is likely a little suspect. It's hard for us to nail down how long these tires will last given the lack of longevity reports, but I'd hazard that they will get you around 50,000 based on what I've seen and their treadwear rating.
