XYZ Racing Tarmac Rally Coilovers — Honda S2000 AP1/AP2 1999-2009

The AP1 S2000’s high-strung F20C wants revs and a chassis that stays planted when the surface stops being polite – and the AP2’s F22C softened the powerband but kept that same nervous, short-wheelbase rear end that bites the moment a mid-corner ridge unsettles it. The XYZ Racing Tarmac Rally coilover is built for the kind of British B-road and sealed-stage tarmac event where standard dampers run out of travel and aftermarket track kits ride too rigid to keep the tyres on the road.

This is the spec for an S2000 that gets driven on real surfaces – cambered lanes, patched tarmac, the kind of corner where a mid-bump throttle lift on the AP1 used to write owners off into the scenery. Tarmac Rally is the XYZ damper engineered to soak the hit and keep the contact patch loaded, rather than chase the lowest possible lap time on glass-smooth circuits.

What this coilover does for your 1999-2009 Honda S2000

On the S2000 chassis specifically, the gain you feel is rear-axle composure. The AP1 in particular hated being asked to put power down over broken tarmac in second-gear corners; this coilover damps the initial impact instead of pinging the rear wheel skyward, which means the open diff has something to push against and the tail stays where you pointed it. Front-end response sharpens too, but the headline change is mid-corner confidence on surfaces a track coilover would skip across. Spring and damper settings come from XYZ’s own tarmac rally programme, so the kit arrives in a window that suits the S2000’s 1,260 kg kerb weight rather than needing a stack of corner-weight sessions to make it driveable. You still get height adjustment and the platform’s full range, but the baseline is set up to absorb, not to pound.

About the Tarmac Rally coilover

The Tarmac Rally damper is built around one job: absorbing the jolt across a big bump, suppressing shock through the body, and keeping the tyre loaded long enough to find traction on the way out. XYZ developed the valving inside its own tarmac rally racing programme, and every setting in the kit traces back to that competition use – the brief was uneven pavement and stage-spec road surfaces, not billiard-table circuit asphalt. Construction follows XYZ’s standard rally-spec build, with damping calibrated to suppress shock travel into the body rather than transmit it straight to the cabin. The result is a coilover that stays composed when the road bites back, with vehicle stability that lets you commit to a line you would back out of on a stiffer track setup. It is a focused tool – chosen because the use-case is uneven tarmac, not because it is the firmest option on the shelf.

Fitment for the Honda S2000 (1999-2009)

This kit fits the Honda S2000 AP1 and AP2 chassis (HN47) from the 1999 launch through to end of production in 2009, covering both the F20C and F22C cars. Confirm your chassis code matches HN47 before ordering, particularly on early imports and JDM-spec cars.

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Pick your spring rate and height spec below to build the kit for your AP1 or AP2.