Canberra in spring can be disgusting, but a Mazda MX-5 makes it instantly better | Riotact

November 10, 2024
7:10 am

A nice view, and some boats. Photo: James Coleman.

Spring should be the perfect time for the convertible. The sun is shining, the birds are singing, the grass is green … and there’s our problem.

Spring in Canberra looks at a man in a convertible like exposed meat. It wants to get its table grinders out and sprinkle rye-grass dust and plane-tree pollen into your eyes. And then slap you around with 150 km/h winds.

This meant that during my week in the Mazda MX-5, I was popping hay-fever medication like they were hard-boiled lollies. But did I mind? Not one bit. The roof went down on every drive. It was a price, yes, but the payment was juicy.

This particular MX-5, the ND model, is nothing new. It came along in 2015, espoused as cheaper, smaller and lighter than its two previous forebears and closer in spirit to the 1989 original.

But word from Mazda’s engineers suggests the next one may be electric, and so to make the most of the current one, they’ve now released its first update since 2015.

Underneath are new things called ‘Dynamic Stability Control’ and ‘Asymmetric Limited Slip Differential’ designed to make it better, primarily on a racetrack. Inside, there’s a reshaped eight-inch touchscreen, and outside, new light graphics for the front and back.

So naturally, we just had to try it out.

This one is the GT RS model, which adds lighter BBS wheels, mightier Brembo brakes, Bilstein suspension and a front strut brace.

There are those who have argued the MX-5 needs a turbocharger pretty much since the man who designed it was conceived. Without it, only a hairdresser would ever consider one, they say.

But there is something deliciously old-fashioned about a big-displacement engine teamed with a manual gearbox and rear-wheel drive, ensconced in a body that weighs about the same as a toothpick – nothing more, nothing less.

You do have to stoop to get in. Photo: James Coleman.

In this case, you have a two-litre four-cylinder and a six-speed manual to play with, although there is also an auto available on some models.

Besides, this car is about smelling the roses as much as it is about flying past them, and a turbocharger would turn it ballistic and its owner into the sort of pubescent who wakes the neighbours at 5 am and thinks it’s funny.

As it is, there’s ample power and torque from the moment you take off from a corner in third gear – when you really should have changed down to second – all the way up to the engine’s stratospheric 7500 rpm redline.

And because it’s only shifting a smidge over a tonne, it’s utterly unstressed.

But the best part is the way it handles. Mazda has tinkered with the steering and throttle for 2024 to make both more responsive and with the wheels about level with your shoulders, you wear the MX-5 like Iron Man wears his suit. How fast can I take this corner? Oh, I know – because the outside of the right rear tyre is just beginning to struggle for grip. It really becomes a part of you.

Are you really going that fast? It’s hard to tell because of how small it is and how close to the ground you are, but it feels fast, and that’s what matters. That doesn’t take your license away.

The rest of the time, it’s hard not to catch yourself slouching in the seat, draping an arm over the body-coloured window sill and tossing out casual two-fingered waves at every pedestrian crossing.

You feel cool. A bit like a zit on the nose at times when absolutely everyone else is looking down at you at traffic lights, but mostly cool.

The only downside is on the highway when there’s quite a bit of buffeting. Even with the roof up and with Bose speakers built into the headrests, easy listening becomes difficult. Around town, you’ll also have coughing fits from old VW Transporters chuffing blue smoke into your face.

Unfortunately, there are no pills to cure either of these things. But as before, you suffer in the MX-5 through times like these for literally every other time.