One thing you may want to do is check the tire pressure on your Donut. In the past, I would forget to check that when filling my tires, since it's a pain to unload the trunk to reach it. That tire is rated at 60 PSI. Last time I filled them, they were at 30 PSI. The donut, since it is so small compared to a normal tire, will need to have much higher pressure to maintain its shape with all the weight of the car on top of it -- a larger volume tire won't deform as much at the same pressure. While an underinflated donut will feel rock-solid with no load on it, if you pile the weight of the car onto it, it will compress a lot donuts are made extra sticky to compenate for their small contact area as it so, so running flat could lead to huge rolling resistance.

I found the OEM tires offered the best tradeoff of performance and comfort at around 45 psi cold, up to that point the MPG, handling, and steering-feel improved dramatically. Above that I saw diminishing MPG improvement, but an increasinginly noisy and rough ride. 30 psi (stock) feels like a boat.

Once it got into the last rainy season, I knew it was time to switch tires after a particular incident. I stopped at a stop-sign to make a right onto a busy street. I hit the gas to go immediately after stopping as I had an opening to turn. Auto-stop kicked in, and I had to wait for the engine to wind down AND back up. By that time, I had the gas pedal depressed so the engine started to rev before the transmission re-engaged. Once that finally re-engaged, the engine was revving fast enough to make the crappy tires spin in place (damp road), the loss in traction caused the engine to rev up to almost 5000 rpm, so I instinctively backed off the gas pedal, at which point the tires found traction and pulled me into the intersection. I had to floor it to avoid making the cross-traffic slam their brakes.

I found a good deal on some 16" chrome wheels with Kumho 711 tires. Even as a summer tire, the Kumhos handle better in pouring rain than the stock tires did on dry ground. I saw more than a milage hit than I would have liked, but the handling feels like a high-end sports car compared to before. It feels as if the car would flip over before the tires would slide around tight turns, and the wider tread means that the tires no longer tramline (follow grooves in the road).

I run max sidewall on those (44psi), the same pressure as my previous tires, though the ride is a bit softer as the lower-profile tire (less air volume) compresses more at the same pressure.