This handsome mid-sized saloon is a pleasure to look at and a pleasure to drive. With plenty of leg-room front and rear, the only space drawback is the diminishing headroom at the back (sloping roofs tend to do this). The boot offers a generous 519 litres of space, which expands to an ample 1019 litres with the rear seats folded.

You’ll get an exceptionally enjoyable drive out of this series; it has excellent suspension, the front-wheel drive gives superb road grip, and it’s got some real zip and verve. There are three petrol models (one at 1.8 litres, one at 2.0 litres and the last at 2.5 litre) and a 2.0 litre diesel. All give exceptional performances (although the basic petrol model is a little feebler than the others).

The car looks and feels well-crafted and sturdy and has surprisingly high quality interior specifications.  It’ll never feature as James Bond’s next vehicle, but it delivers excellent quality all round, a responsive and enjoyable driving experience and good fuel economy. The Mazda 6 may well be under-rated – what it lacks in ‘coolness’ it more than makes up for in performance and elegance.

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The Mazda MX-5 is the best selling roadster of all time and with the new version nothing changes. The 2.0 litre sport is the model to go for if you’re going to purchase one, as it has most of the optional extras, one thing you will find is that the basic models are very basic and you will want to spec it up with optional extras where as the 2.0 litre sport comes with pretty much everything like sports seats, scruff plates, windblocker and traction control.
Both engines require a lot of pushing to get the best from them which is fine and once you’re in the car you tend to forget about but they seem to lack anything power wise at the bottom end. The new MX-5 is slighter bigger and has more features than the previous versions yet only weighs about 9kg more, all the weight saving has been done with the smaller items your likely not to know are different like the rear view mirror is 82grams lighter.

Been Japanese this car should life a trouble free life and run for ever if it’s well looked after and serviced regularly. The MX-5 is guaranteed to give you a spirited drive and is very cosy ride for 2 people and still offer decent boot space.

The metal roof fully retracts in 12 seconds and folds away neatly without compromising boot space. There is a bit of wind noise from the MX-5, but cheaper Convertibles do tend to have slightly more noise.

Mazda MX-5

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