A bit of snow last night rendered the dip and hill (think of a mini Eau Rouge at Spa for the shape of the road through this bit) at the end of the village a bit slippery. The sort of snow that compacts to a thin, glassy finish offering little grip. On my way to work this morning, I stopped to help a lady in a hatchback that had got stuck half way up the hill. I parked back at the top of the hill with hazards on whilst I helped her sort out her towing eye. Good job I did - a couple of lads in a Focus found out how slippery it was. 30mph is quick in a village at any time. On this stuff it was 20mph too fast. Lucky for them the field entrance they found themselves facing was long so the rough surface stopped them before they got to the gate. They decided that if the flat road was slippery, then the hill was best avoided and turned around. Hate to think of the outcome if they'd come at us on the hill at that speed!

Then along comes one of those US crew cab pickup trucks. Appears to be RWD and fitted with Bakelite tyres. Having narrowly avoided us on four locked up wheels, she then couldn't get any drive at all. RWD and no weight over the rear wheels. So I drove down, hooked her up and dragged her back up and along the village to a spot with some fresh snow that she could get some grip on. Nice US military girl. No idea what she was doing - didn't even know how the park brake on the truck worked. She even asked if she should leave the box in park whilst I towed her! Anyway, the Sport made light of moving her barge out of the way. And I had to tow her up backwards because there was no way she was turning it around.

Impressed by the Grabber ATs on this stuff. Braking grip was poor as might be expected (it really was quite slippery) but they managed to find enough traction to pull vehicles up the hill. The T/C was working a bit too at one point, mind. This was in high range with a light throttle touch and Terrain Response in normal mode - didn't need grass/gravel/snow mode. Did use HDC to help control my reversing back down the hill. Bloody good system, HDC.

SWMBO told me that half an hour later there were 6 vehicles stranded, including "a 4x4", at the bottom of the dip. She even saw someone stop at the top, look at the collection of vehicles down there and then decide to join them!

Ironically, having helped these two ladies out of their snowy predicament, I ended up taking an extra hour on the A34 getting to work because of shunts. So much for karma!  2012 SDV6 - it's missing a couple of cylinders
2008 TDV8 - it was a labour of love and is much missed

I have those tyres on my sport too - they find great traction in snow and even ice. As you say it makes no real difference to braking but it does mean you don't get stuck!