And the award for the best affordable British sports car goes to...
November 25th 2007 13:34
The Mazda MX5 / Miata.
Now before you choke on your cocoa, not counting the MG RV8, the MGB died over a quarter of a century ago, along with the TR7/ 8, the MG Midget was already buried, Austin Healey was bereft of life. The British sports car industry has tried valiantly to soldier on but all the remaining English patients keep having emergency surgery to keep them alive. Look at TVR, Marcos, Jensen all raised from the dead several times only too be laid to rest once more, Ashes to ashes, dust to.....
Morgan are probably the longest survivor and although geriatric they keep on selling, If you order one now a 2009 delivery should be right, make mine BRG with wires please!
On release the MX5 / Miata was an old concept, rear wheel drive, two seater, roadster. Looking a whole lot like the Lotus Elan, not the dodgy Isuzu powered one that ended up as a Kia but the Mid sixties Elan with chrome hubcaps. It was a risk for Mazda at the time and it payed off handsomely, the concept worked in 1989 and it still works now in 2007. The car combines the best of British sports car idealism and Japanese reliability to produce the best British sports car ever. The MX5 simply has no peer.
Now I have to admit, I always used to lust after an MGB until I drove one a lot of years ago, the realisation that was an OLD car hit me fairly quickly, but the last time I drove an MX5 which was an early Nineties model, it still did everything right. It stopped, it handled, the gear- lver still went snick, snick as you downchanged, the roof goes up and down from the drivers seat and it didnt breal down!!
With the advent of imports from Japan of Japanese spec Eunos roadsters, the opportunity exists to buy a truly affordable sports car that wont break the bank in servicing costs. In fact with the money you saved over an MGB you should be able to afford a wooden steering wheel and some nice stringback gloves just to keep the feeling alive.
Now before you choke on your cocoa, not counting the MG RV8, the MGB died over a quarter of a century ago, along with the TR7/ 8, the MG Midget was already buried, Austin Healey was bereft of life. The British sports car industry has tried valiantly to soldier on but all the remaining English patients keep having emergency surgery to keep them alive. Look at TVR, Marcos, Jensen all raised from the dead several times only too be laid to rest once more, Ashes to ashes, dust to.....
Morgan are probably the longest survivor and although geriatric they keep on selling, If you order one now a 2009 delivery should be right, make mine BRG with wires please!
On release the MX5 / Miata was an old concept, rear wheel drive, two seater, roadster. Looking a whole lot like the Lotus Elan, not the dodgy Isuzu powered one that ended up as a Kia but the Mid sixties Elan with chrome hubcaps. It was a risk for Mazda at the time and it payed off handsomely, the concept worked in 1989 and it still works now in 2007. The car combines the best of British sports car idealism and Japanese reliability to produce the best British sports car ever. The MX5 simply has no peer.
Now I have to admit, I always used to lust after an MGB until I drove one a lot of years ago, the realisation that was an OLD car hit me fairly quickly, but the last time I drove an MX5 which was an early Nineties model, it still did everything right. It stopped, it handled, the gear- lver still went snick, snick as you downchanged, the roof goes up and down from the drivers seat and it didnt breal down!!
With the advent of imports from Japan of Japanese spec Eunos roadsters, the opportunity exists to buy a truly affordable sports car that wont break the bank in servicing costs. In fact with the money you saved over an MGB you should be able to afford a wooden steering wheel and some nice stringback gloves just to keep the feeling alive.
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