After speaking with my friend who's a former solo National Tour winner, I'm looking to replace my front struts with Tokico HP's:
Tokico HP Struts
These come stock on the Mazdaspeed Protege and should be noticeably better than my stockers. They're not adjustable and aren't as good as konis, but should work well with the stockers which I'll be keeping in the back.
These HP's will only need to last me until this winter when I'll be upgrading to konis...
or maybe even Ohlins struts!
