My wife does auto-x and road courses. Sebring mostly and have been to Barber motorsports part in Alabama and Road Atlanta twice.

I'm no expert on suspension and chassis setup. So please dont take what I say as expert tech. Its not,.. and should someone with more experience have a different point of view then you should certainly take their tech with precedence over mine.

My wife had a 96 Cobra that she ran for 3 years on various courses. It was already lowered when we got the car but was using completely stock suspension components on aftermarket 17x9 Cobra-R wheels with 275x40 R17 tires front and rear.

We experimented using different wheels because there was a guy in a fox coupe running 17x8 wheels with 245/45 R17 tires that was ripping up the track and turning in much better times. Before you say better driver,.. my wife is classified as 'Experienced Solo' class at Sebring. This means she goes out and runs the course with no instructor and is allow to run pretty much wide open during class events. As far as a road course goes,.. she can out shift and out drive me any day of the week and I like to think of myself as a pretty good driver,. yet she will consistently turn in better lap times. So we tired some stock 17x8 wheels with 245/45 Hoosier A6 radials and she ran the same as when she had the 275/40 with Hoosier A6 radials. So it wasnt a matter of traction as much as it was getting the suspension to keep the tires planted on the ground.

We found that running 17x10.5 rims with 315 rubber back there actually resulted in less traction and reduced lap times then staying with 17x8 or 17x9 wheels. They made the car extremely loose in the turns. And in all honesty,.. my wife says the smaller 17x8 wheels felt the most comfortable on the road course.

96 - 98 GT can run 15 inch wheels front and rear. The stock brakes on the 94 - 98 GT's are pretty pathetic. I know,.. I had 2 96 GT's and a my wifes 96 Cobra to compare to. The Cobra with its 13 inch rotors and twin pistons PBR calipers is a world of difference on the road course compared to the GT brakes. The GT would experience brake fade on the first lap at Sebring,.. where the Cobra (with slotted rotors and ceramic pads) could go 5 laps before some minor brake fade was experienced. An easy affordable improvement to the 94 - 98 GT's is the use of the 99 - 04 PBR calipers. They are the same as what is used on the Cobra's,.. just a smaller rotor.

As for wheels for auto-x. I dunno,.. I would stay with 17x8 (245/45 tires) or possibly try 17x9 wheels with 275/40 tires. But realize that your not going to see much improvement from stickier tires unless your suspension is setup to handle them. We went through a year of trial and error before we found a suspension setup sturdy enough for daily use yet able to perform well at the track. I dont think going to 15 or 16 inch wheels will offer any advantages for auto-x or road course tracks. You would be better off with 17 or 18 inch wheels and a low profile tire with minimal sidewall flex. The complete opposite of what you want with a drag wheel/tire setup.

Personally I would contact Car and Concepts of Tampa (Cars & Concepts, Inc.) and let them give you some idea's for your car. They are the experts and probably the best in the area. They are the only shop in the area that I know of that can accurately align fully adjustable tubular suspension setups with watts links and various other setups. Prime example was my wife's 2004 Tiburon. Stock suspension on Tiburons suck,.. plain and simple. Way worse then a stock Mustang GT. So I put Eibach Sportline springs on the car and took it to Georges' here in New Port Richey thinking they had enough common sense to be able to align a lowered car. After we got the car back from them it was pulling to the right. I took it back. They said becuase the car had been lowered that the stock alignment settings would be off. I blew up and went off on guy in the off. I said No shit Shirlock,.. the car has been lowered. I explained that to you when I brought the car in here. The factory alignment settings no longer apply. If your guy doesnt have enough common sense to see that and align the car accordingly then I want my money back and I will take the car somewhere that can. They didnt want to refund me because they said I 'modified the car' and they only know how to program factory settings into their alignment machine. They are fucking useless. I managed to get back half and settled for that. I took the car down to Cars and Concepts,.. it cost me $130 for the alignment,.. but,.. the car was right and rode perfect afterwards. They did her Cobra when we had it,.. and from here on out,.. I wont go anywhere else for alignments. They do an excellent job.

Hurst