Tire: Ecsta SPT
Category: Ultra High Performance Summer
UTQG (treadwear): 320 AA A
The Kumho Ecsta SPT (KU31) is a well-liked value based summer performance tire that was built to provide three-season (hence, summer, hence not winter) for drivers of sports cars and higher horsepower vehicles. Kumho decided to utilize a High Dispersion Silica tread compound to make this summer tire more useful in colder temperatures, and it also has rotation wear indicators so the tires will tell you when they need to be rotated...pretty sweet. Even though this tire has a wider temperature range than other summer tires, you still shouldn't drive it on snow or ice, or anything around or under near freezing temperatures.
For me, the Kumho Ecsta SPT is a top ten tire for the ultra high performance summer category. It's not quite in the top five, but it's pretty close. In terms of value for what you pay, this tire has a lot of others in this performance category beat though. Drivers have found the Ecsta SPT to be a solid choice in rain or on dry pavement, though it's traction is less than the top performers in this category. You'll be able to get about 50,000 miles out of a set, as long as you're not spending too much time aggressive driving or doing autocross work. Towards the end of their life, these tires will get noisy so its important to make sure you rotate them as often as indicated, or at least every 5,000 miles to limit the road noise later in life. Overall these are great tires for the money and make for a good value if you're looking for an aggressive summer tire.
