So how good are they? Would it be an upgrade in performance to buy illuminis or koni yellows? My car has tein springs also, and all together its stiff as hell. For those with experience, is my setup anywhere near ideal for tracking compared to other setups, of course not race-set coilovers.

 

Your setup is plenty good enough to get tracking on....your driving skills will not be anywhere near equal to the car's ability unless you have been tracking the car a while. The only "upgrade" to aftermarket will be adjustability.

 

anymore opinions?

 

I agree with Rynberg. I was running R1 shocks for a long time - 125k miles. Work very well. Here is another guy who ran H&Rs:
https://www.rx7club.com/suspension-wheels-tires-brakes-archive-112/h-r-springs-r1-shocks-justification-194635/

I'm running Konis now b/c the rear shocks were getting soft and slow to respond.

 

The R1 shocks are good. No sense in trying anything else until you've driven it some and know what you want it to do differently.

 

very good write up. After reading it tho, i realized that maybe my Tein S-tech springs might have too high spring rate. Its 436 (7.8) in the front and 324 (5.8) in the rear. They are progressive, but compared to other springs, they are very stiff. Will this negatively affect my handling for higher speed handling?

 

The Tein's are linear springs. IMO, they are too high of a spring rate for the stock shocks and I always recommend aftermarket shocks with them.

 

a lot of people told me they work good with r1's.

 

I agree with Mahjik. That is a bit high for stock shock damping rates. I had to adjust my Konis a turn stiffer just to properly control my H&Rs which aren't as high of a rate as the Teins.

If you are happy with them, I suppose its all good, but with those rates you may benefit with an adjustable shock like the Koni or Tokico set stiffer.