I hear you on the looks 4DRHTRD caluse most of us aren't racing around all the time to make the difference in performance significatnt. This months edition of Sport Compact Car has some good info on this concept. When you keep the OD the same, but have larger rims you are replacing the weight of the rubber with the weight of the metal in the rim and doing so at a distance from the centre of the rim. Since a given weight has an effect that increases exponentially as the distance from the centre of the rim increases linearly you have to have a rim material that weighs less than the rubber it replaces which is a difficult proposition. Then when you add in the idea of rotational inertia larger rims are even less favourable.
Given all this I wonder why Mitsubishi elected to go with larger rims on the new Evo given that it is the performance marque for compact sedans.
R