Unsurprisingly, I am again finding that summer tyres and ice don't mix. However, I am too lazy to want to swap between summer and winter tyres twice a year. If I were in North America, I would have options such as Continental ExtremeContact DWS that have the same speed rating as my original tyres, and are designed to be used all year round. This tyre seems to offer quite acceptable summer performance, and greatly improved winter performance, compared to a summer tyre. Why is it that tyres like these are unavailable in the UK, with only full winter tyres on sale?

Full winter tyres often have lower speed ratings than manufacturers fit as standard, which makes insurers nervous. I have contacted Continental, which responded that it had no plans to introduce the ExtremeContact DWS to the UK, and failed to recommend anything from its range for all-year use to replace my current PremiumContact 215/55 R16 93Ws.