Slalom

THE SLALOM, or ‘swerve and recover’ test, is a neat way to gather data on a tyre’s transient grip level – and collision avoidance ability – in the space of six seconds. Ren did upwards of 50 slalom runs, with an entry speed of 65km/h, and rarely clipped a cone marker – it only happened when a tyre let the car slip slightly off line. But here, with masses of run-off area, the consequences of a lose – or a cone collision – are nil. On the road, the obstacle you find yourself desperately trying to avoid might be a jaywalker or another car. Clearly, a tyre that can respond quickly has the ability to save your bacon. With ESC off, the Mazda 6 was free to express a bit of attitude on some of the tyres – notably, the Continental, which allowed a fair amount of tail-wagging – but the stopwatches and the Performance Box told the full story. The Conti wasn’t slow, but neither was it the quickest. The median time between the series of six cones spaced 17 metres apart was 5.41 seconds, and the best and worst were 5.22sec and 5.67sec respectively, a nine percent spread.