SETTING THE PACE
Mazda’s 2017 MX-5 is defining the brand
Mazda is a company that understands its place in the world market.
They have no illusions of beating Toyota or Volkswagen on their way to being the world’s largest carmaker. They are perfectly happy filling a niche that will always exist.
Their cars appeal to people who enjoy driving, but aren’t at the point where they can afford to choose driving fun as their primary reason for buying a car. So Mazda defines itself by making compacts, crossovers and sedans that drive much better than their price would suggest.
In fact, they all sort of handle like Mazda’s famed Miata, for some reason renamed the MX-5 a moniker which probably never send serious chills down an enthusiast’s spine. I recently spent a week in a Mazda MX-5 Grand Touring. The car I tested had an MSRP of $31,015. For that you got a tiny trunk in a car that is everything the legendary British roadsters wished they could be.
The most noticeable thing is how analog it feels. Granted, it has many of the same safety features of others, but they don’t disconnect your wheels and bottom from being completely in touch with what’s happening with the wheels and the suspension.
The 2.0-liter DOHC 16-valve 4-cylinder engine sends its 155-hp. and 148-lb.ft. of peak torque through a wonderful six-speed manual that snick-snick-snicks through the gears with such precision that you want to shift just to feel it.
It also sends that power to the rear wheels, where physics make the most of the power. I know there’s an automatic, but if you want to own one of these, learn to drive a stick. Since the car weighs in at just over 2300-lb. that is plenty of horsepower to have fun with.
If anyone considering one cares, the fuel economy is rated at 27 mpg city and 34 mpg on the highway. With the automatic it gets the same city mileage, but 36 mpg on the open road.
The brakes are huge, 11in. disks, front and rear. The front suspension is a doublewishbone with aluminum control arms and monotube
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