The best brakes for track days (and driving home after)!

Firstly which model/year are we talking?

If you don't care about dusting and your not running a big brake kit, then plain disks, Castrol SRF fluid and Carbotech XP10 pads are the best things I've ever used, cold or hot. They might be over kill on the 5 so XP8s would probably be equally as good too. You'll need good fluid to cope with heat generated, not some generic stuff, budget for Castrol SRF, Motul RBF600/660/700 or ATE Superblue for example and consider upgrading the brake lines from rubber to steel braided, I use HEL.

Freakyparts are good for this stuff they do the pads and lines. freakyparts.co.uk/

For reference I've used the following that I can recall:

OEM Brembo, lots of fade, good for road use.
EBC Greenstuff, near death experience, I hear they have improved other compounds such as yellow stuff but no joke, I nearly died. For clarification, a lorry didn't see me and pulled out on a 60mph road, full emergency stop and the foot went to the floor (abs car), as the 2 month old pad disintergrated and fell away from the backing plate on the fronts. Lots of handbrake action and had to ditch into the verge to avoid, was too close to going under it, very shook up and a properly angery boi as a result. These were professionally fitted with brand new EBC disks and bedded in correctly. Never again EBC you kents.
Mintex 1144, very good, heavy dust and wear and go off quickly.
Performance Friction Z Rated pads, again, heavy dust/wear and worse than Mintex.
Performance Friction 08s, overheated after a few laps 300bhp Exige S2 8-900kg.
Carbotech XP10 - 45 minutes non stop at Snetterton in the summer in a 1100kg 280hp car, didn't even have to manage them, absolute perfection. I also used these in Novemeber and February in sub 4°C without issue. 

mm tempted by xp8s :-)

I have EBC green stuff on my 1.6, I never use it on track, but find them more than adequate. Plenty of dust.
Oh, and I loooove Marmite.

These are light cars so IMHE tend not to eat brakes, therefore you can justify a bit of expense.

First port of call is to change the fluid unless you know it’s been done recently with good quality stuff. That will help the pedal feel a lot firmer.

Pads; as per above. I currently use carbon lorraine RC5+, but have also had good results with Ferrodo DS2500.

There’s a massive choice here-

bofiracing.co.uk/brakes/brake-pads/

Thanks for the link!

Those carbotech are not cheap...

Interesting stuff Rich. Roddisons pads look like good value too- I think I’ll buy a set & have a play with them at a trackday.

No, but they are literally the best pads I've ever used on track. I cant speak for the Roadster, so like I say the 10s may be overkill and you'll get locking issues, maybe even the 8s are, but when I used them on a heavier, more powerful car I stopped coasting and braking early, and literally stayed on the throttle until the last braking board I felt brave enough to brake at and they just work, having 100% trust brakes is a beautiful thing. If you don't have confidence in them you stay on them more, braking earlier and longer and end up putting more and more heat through them each lap compounding the problem.

I'm williing to give others a try on the Roadster I'm sure the Rodders pads will be a good start, its a big ol' saving and I'm certainly not averse to that for sure.

Also, whilst some of these pads are expensive, the Roadster doesn't eat pads (I think Ive done one set in the last 6 years lol) so something to consider is having two sets for road and track.... put some low dusting decent road pads on when your off track and you'll get a lot more life out of your expensive track pads only using them in their optimum window.