The Mazda 3 is the essence of lightness and agility, yet it’s as solid as an I-beam. It responds almost telepathically to inputs, notably the gratifying shifter, a device that Volkswagen and BMW would be proud to have hatched. You can jump rudely in and out of the throttle without inducing driveline snatch. Tracking, even in strong crosswinds, is excellent, with fluid turn-in and an omnipresent sense of stability. In fact, this third-gen 3 has doubled its caster angle, which encourages the steering to track straight. On the original-equipment M&S tires, the ride/handling trade-off is just about perfect. NVH levels, for what is essentially an economy car, are extraordinarily low, although wind noise can be heard. At idle, you’ll sometimes glance at the tach to see if the engine is still ticking. The primary and secondary control relationships are bang-on. And the steering is light but pleasantly informative. On two occasions, this car covered 1000 miles in a single day without doing mental or physical damage to its pilot. Even the almond interior meets our approval—bright and optimistic while so far resisting grubbiness.
here comes the nitpicking: The location of the 12-volt power outlet means the cord for your radar detector sometimes tries to strangle the shifter. We’d like to experiment with pads to see if we can get a slightly firmer brake pedal. The front seats could use a little more lateral bolstering. The Audi-like radio-volume control, just behind the shifter, is still not intuitive after 11 months of reaching for it. And the hood-release pull and fuel-flap release are side-by-side, meaning you’ll accidentally open the hood at every other fuel stop. And, uh, that’s about it.
The last time the entire C/D staff happily agreed as wholeheartedly as this, it was for free beer on Fridays.
Nothing went wrong. Well, a couple of radio-lockup issues were reported, but they seem to have vanished following a software update at the second service. The cost of the two services (at 9940 miles and 18,290 miles) set us back $287 total.
We can’t blame this on the Mazda 3, but one of our editors—a man whose love for this car borders on the obsessive—backed the thing into a post as solid as an aircraft carrier. He felt bad about it but at least didn’t spill his coffee. A new bumper cover set us back $1423.
WHERE WE WENT: Apart from one trip to Chicago, a quick blast to the Indy 500, and a lot of shorter jaunts throughout Michigan, the Mazda 3’s greatest adventure so far has been its tour in Montana, where it spent a happy summer with John Phillips on his Double-J Cat Ranch. In Big Sky country, it made a trip to the funky writers’ haven at the Murray Hotel in Livingston, Montana, and also carried Phillips’s mother-in-law and elderly aunt to Elkhorn Hot Springs, where both ladies refused to take a warming dip naked. Further, the car became lodged within an actual honest-to-God cattle drive, moving along Montana Highway 43, in Wise River, at a speed that matched whatever velocity suited the cowboys’ horses and their twin border collies, one of whom was carrying a softball. Later, the car’s wheel wells had to be hosed out.
Phillips drove the Mazda 3 back to Ann Arbor for our annual10Best soirée, then home again to Montana—4000 miles in 10 days: “It passed those miles competently and in serenity, delivering 12-hour-per-day comfort. This is a charming automobile.
Round two is, so far, a winner. Round one, my first Mazda (and first SUV) was a '14 CX-5, which was a revelation. Now that the grandkids can get in and out of the back seat on their own, I decided to revert to my preferred automobile size (smaller), since I'm mostly by myself in the vehicle. So I traded the CX-5 after only 2 years (not my usual style) and drove away from the dealer in a bare-bones iSport Mazda3 hatchback. C&D's test vehicle is a loaded "S," but that's way out of my price league, and much of the electronic stuff that comes with the upscale models is stuff I won't use anyway. So I bought the bottom of the line. The only factory addition is the "Soul Red" paint. The engine and transmission, the same as in the CX-5, are a delight to work with, and because the 3 is smaller, lower and 350 lbs. or so lighter than the CX-5, it's also quicker and more nimble. I've only had it 3 weeks, but in this early infatuation stage, I'm thinking I might keep it for a decade, at least. I've noticed a little – but only a little – of the brake issue that "Woodypup" mentioned, and I do think the placement of the infotainment screen sticking
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