Owner feedback on the Bridgestone Potenza S001 is mixed (64.5% average), with most agreement around strong dry grip and capable dry handling, but significant dissatisfaction in other areas. Around half of owners who mention it criticise wet grip, with some describing it as confidence-sapping or even dangerous in the rain, particularly as temperatures drop. Comfort and refinement are the biggest consistent drawbacks: roughly two in five report high road noise and around a third find the ride harsh. Tread life splits owners almost evenly, so longevity appears to depend heavily on car, setup and driving style.
What owners mention most counted across 139 reviews
2012 model year (Mk2 facelift) 180 PS estate. Second user purchase, supplying dealer fitted pair of S001 to the rear axle. I can't really comment on the grip and handling as the front is shod with Turanza ER300s, which are touring tyres. Thus there's not really any opportunity to overwhelm the rear. They're not especially quiet, not especially comfortable but not notably bad at either. Wear will ultimately dictate whether I replace the fronts with S001s or go with Michelin Pilot Sport 4 instead. It's not an outrageously fast car and doesn't really demand outright high performance tyres. I am not brave enough to swap tyres front to rear as I think S001 at the front and ER300 at the rear might prove to be slightly more interesting to review. For perhaps all the wrong reasons!
When the tyres were fitted, I was shocked becouse of the dry grip (small roundabout with 25 mph easily). I've never experienced this kind of grip. The brake distance, the handling, the road feadback is excellent! Everything is perfect; everything except the WET GRIP. When I first drove in rain shower, I was also shocked! Aquaplaning, terrible grip and brake distance... I'm really sad, bacouse I love these tyres, but on a rainy day these are NOT safe tyres. Let's try Yokohama Advan Flevas...
Check out how the BEST all seasons tyres perform against premium summer and winter tyres!
Wet: this tyre has no traction at all to 3rd gear on wet surfaces, average grip in turns, but good aquaplanning resistance in my opinion.
Dry: My car have 2.0T engine with 350nm of torque, DSG and LSD results: First - no traction, Second - if dry and hot not on entire rev range, if colder no traction at all, especially when downshift from 3rd to 2nd, Third sometimes slips, Above - OK. Good stability at high speeds.
Cornering - very good response and feel - it's the advantage of this tyres, but tend to loose traction sometimes without warning, but in fully controlable way. Safe braking in turns when situation needs it.
Wear: After ~15500 miles/~25000km fronts are worn out to 1 mm above indicator, and rears are in ~60%. Not good at all, but I'm spirited driver so hard to tell.
Comfort: This tyre is LOUD, and very STIFF, if somebody likes it - OK, but in my opinion not suitable for cars like Golf GTI, Octavia RS, it hasn't have any comfort features.
Changed to: Michelin Pilot Sport 4 in the same size - for my ears at least ~50% quieter, ~30% less stiff - so much better comfort, much better rolling from speed, above 1st gear traction is good or perfect, cornering is much less "dramatic" sensation - just feel of glue between tyre and road. Only disadvantage is that MPS4 has less road feedback by ~ 20%, but who cares if glues to surface well?
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Very grippy tires both in dry and wet. Roadnoise is high as well and lasted about 25 000 km. Overall good performance tires with too much noise and on uneven roads tends to affect steering wheel too much.
OEM fit from Mazda. In the damp or wet I daren't push them as they don't inspire confidence and the rear has twitched unexpectedly a few times (both mine and the cars)! This could be because I'm a spanner and this is my first RWD car, but I don't think 160 bhp should be troubling these! Also had the ABS cut-in unexpectedly a couple of times, albeit on a surface I know to have poor grip when wet.
No complaints about performance in the dry though, generally very difficult to unstick, responsive, feedback well, comfortable, not too squidgy on the sidewall either. Haven't noticed the noise issues some others have mentioned (although these are the only tyres I've had on the car and I generally have the roof down).
Wear is APPALLING I've never known a tyre go down so quickly and I've had soft stuff like Rainsports before. At 8000 miles there's probably 3 mm tread on the rear and 3.5 on the front. I don't think they'll manage much beyond 11,000 miles (17k km). I'm going to replace with Michelin PS3, PS4, Contisport 5 or Rainsport 3.
SUMMARY: Great in the warm and dry. No more than average in cool and damp. Would like to swap them before winter hits because I think they'll be very poor near any snow. Wear out veerrryy quickly.
I bought these for my subaru impreza to replace the like new continental sport contact 5's. The reason i changed is that the conti's sidewall's were too weak (94Y XL) and when corning at higher speeds you got no feedback from the front end, these suit the car very well.
These tyres take around 500 miles to bed in and the steering feel becomes around 20% when they are.
Dry grip on these tyres is very good and in the wet they are more than adequate for road use. I was never a fan of bridgestone tyres but this is my 3 set of these on different cars inc the new Golf R and i think this is the reason the Golf R is noted for having descent steering, something not usually written in a review of a VAG car.
