MX-5 mojo trialled by media

Journalists are a competitive lot and none more so than automotive types, some of whom take beating their rivals to the chequered flag even more seriously than being first to a story.

Car-makers know this better than most and it’s why a stopwatch will rarely be seen wherever motoring scribes and cars converge in numbers, for fear of a media event becoming a PR nightmare or worse.

But all that changed last week when Mazda staged the 2013 Mazda MX-5 Media Challenge, in which no fewer than 22 of Australia’s finest – as judged by Mazda – automotive hacks competed in four distinct motorsport disciplines in identical MX-5s to determine a winner.

For Mazda, it was a cunning way to generate publicity for the third generation of the world’s most popular two-seat sports car, which is now eight-years-old but was recently upgraded for the 2013 model year before an all-new replacement arrives in 2015.

For us, it was a chance to exact revenge on the crack Russian media team that claimed narrow victories on home ‘turf’ against six Aussie journos in previous (slightly less risky) MX-5 ice races held in 2011 and again in 2012.

The third Australia-versus-Russia press contest once again took place in near-standard MX-5s (including some from last year’s press launch) fitted with race brake pads and seats with six-point racing harnesses.

Their folding hard-top roofs were also removed to make way for a CAMS-approved rollbar, not that it provided much protection for many of the oversized locals in their three-layer race suits and race helmets.

This time 22 journos competed in 11 MX-5s (two per car, including four Russians) over four timed events, including skid pan and gymkhana exercises at Canberra’s Sutton Road Driver Training Centre, the nearby Fairbairn Hillclimb and a full-on 6.5km section of gravel forest roads used for the Rally of Canberra.

Needless to say, competition was heated in the first three stages, which saw News Limited’s Josh Dowling claim skid pan honours from Caradvice’s David Zalstein and Top Gear’s James Stanford, before Unique Cars’ Scott Newman defeated Wheels’ Glenn Butler and the NRMA’s Tim Robson in the tricky gymkhana.

Team motoring.com.au also finished just outside the top three in the tight and undulating hill climb event, in which Butler outpaced Newman and Stanford, who starred in the original 2011 ice race in Sweden.

But it was the heart-in-mouth gravel rally stage that really separated the men from the mice, and saw the red mist descend on normally mild-mannered journalists as the chance to win bragging rights over their peers superseded any sense of self-preservation.

Two timed sessions followed a recce lap of the hilly, dusty, bumpy and unforgiving rally stage, which rewarded skill and bravery but punished even the smallest mistake.

With big, nasty rocks, precarious drop-offs, deep ditches and plenty of solid trees lining it, nobody was in any doubt about the consequences of leaving the dauntingly fast and open but heavily rutted, narrow course.

And it was here that Stanford, who rallies old Datsuns in his spare time, made his mark, setting a super-human time of just 4:08 minutes – two seconds quicker than Fairfax’s Toby Hagon and Vladimir Melnikov. The talented young Russian scorched home in an equal-second time of 4:10, having raced only in selected Scandinavian rallies in very different conditions.

Butler was fourth with 4:12, four seconds ahead of yours truly (4:18), which was enough for Team motoring.com.au to clinch fifth overall behind winner Stanford, who tallied 220 points to beat home Butler, Hagon and Dowling.

Because points scored on the rally stage were multiplied by four (as the most difficult of the four weighted disciplines), it was also sufficient for us to claim the team prize alongside the RASA’s Mark Borlace, who finished 10th overall.

Despite the testing environment and drive-it-like-you-stole-it torture of 22 seasoned motor testers, the only mechanical failure (apart from scuffed bodywork, one puncture and 16 squared-off wheels) was suffered by our #7 car, which went into limp-home mode during my final enthusiastic gymkhana run before being quickly rectified.

That speaks volumes not just for the engineering and durability of one of the world’s few affordable rear-wheel drive sports cars, but the ability of the giant-killing MX-5 to put grins on the faces of some of the most cynical judges anywhere between Yass and Yekaterinburg.