Mazda CX-30

REPORT 4

£28,875 OTR/£29,425 as tested/£353pcm

WHY IT’S HERE

What’s it like to live with a SkyActiv engine?

DRIVER

Sam Philip

SOME GIT’S ONLY GONE AND SCRATCHED IT. LEFT THE CX-30 PARKED up on our quiet street for the weekend, returned to it on Monday morning to discover a proper scrape to the offside front, generously incorporating two panels and a bit of headlight, plus a scuffed wing mirror for good measure. No apology note, naturally. A classic clip-and-run.

OK, it’s hardly totalled, and I realise there are greater frustrations and injustices in the world right now. But seriously, who takes a chunk out the side of a car then does a runner? Not a rhetorical question. I want names. If anyone’s spotted a van – because it’s always a van – with a smear of Blue Mica paint down its side and a driver clearly prepared to allow our nation’s social fabric to unravel little by little, please get in touch.

In cheerier news, I’ve taken up a new hobby: actually cleaning my car. Normally I’m not one for fastidious detailing or even basic automotive hygiene, but all this new-found spare time seemed a good opportunity to properly acquaint myself with the ol’ hose ’n’ bucket ’n’ shampoo ’n’ chamois. What better way, after all, to really get to grips with a car’s design intricacies, to appreciate its subtlest styling details up close and personal?

And after many hours at the soapy coalface, I can report two things. Thing one: the CX-30 does indeed have many subtle styling details to be appreciated at close quarters. The sharp edged detailing of the light clusters is particularly intricate, while the panel gaps reveal themselves to be consistent all round. (Yep, panel gap chat. Lockdown’s hitting us all hard.)

Thing two: I am rubbish at washing cars. A 20-minute job for a regular human takes me an entire afternoon, at the end of which the bloody thing is still smeared with soap residue and grime. Still, looks like I’m going to have plenty more time to practise my bucketwork…