Articles

960kg of Unbridled Joy

Brian Nash

When the question is about pure and unfiltered sports cars, affordable and reliable topless motoring, or the best bang-for-buck weekend track car you can conjure, the answer is always Miata. At least, that’s what all the Mazda Miata clubs and a lot of the weekend racers will tell you. They are such formidable racing machines – with their stellar combination of lightness, reliability, aftermarket support, and nimble handling – that showing up for a 24 Hours of Lemons race in anything but the most clapped-out Miata is sure to have you classed up into the rafters. One Lemons staffer – referencing their famous bribe-based car classing system – told me I could pile a whole case of Pappy Van Winkle bourbon and 80 pounds of live Maine lobsters on the hood of my trusty Miata and still be classed out of my league and should expect a weekend of snark from everyone for showing up in such an obvious ringer. The MX-5 Miata is that famously good. And mine’s only the 1.6 Liter!

What makes these simple, snappy little Mazdas so beloved and so good? It could be the perfect “snick” of every shift and the eagerly-high-revving engine, so perfectly mated to each other. It could be the light and lean chassis. It could be that these unwaveringly-happy little cars fluttered their pop-up headlights at us in 1989 and wormed their way into our hearts where they have remained ever since.

Well, now you can find out what makes them so special because the incredible talents at Savage Geese Media have pointed their camera at Mazda’s iconic roadster and released a documentary series about the origins and evolutions of the MX-5 Miata.

Part 1 discusses how and why the Miata came to exist in the first place:

Part 2 recounts the legends of the original, the NA series MX-5:

Part 3 examines the evolution into the NB generation:

Part 4 explains the significant changes that arrived with the NC Miata:

Part 5 brings us to today and the ND, where Mazda has tried to recapture the best of the past 30 years into the newest car:

It’s an excellent series, a mix of the history and people behind the Miata along with road tests and comparisons. If you love or have loved a Miata you will probably be happily watching these for the fifth time by now. If you know nothing of the car, this is your chance to peek into the minds of the MX-5 Miata drivers around the world and understand the shape of their obsession.