Testing the Limits - 2014 Mazda Mazda3 S Long-Term Road Test

Edmunds.com

Testing the Limits - 2014 Mazda Mazda3 S Long-Term Road Test

A mountain road trip is a good way to see how a car performs.

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emajor

Nice to know that the Mazda does well in these settings, but we are long past the days when you need to worry about whether a normally-aspirated engine of over 2 liters is capable of getting a compact car up to 8000 ft. It doesn't surprised me at all that a big 184hp four cylinder can haul this thing over a pass.

zimtheinvader

emajor said:

It doesn't surprised me at all that a big 184hp four cylinder can haul this thing over a pass.

the only question left is if it has enough oomph left when the short uphill passing lanes appear to make it past the line of cars driven by people that go "Oh look, a wider section of road. I think I'll speed up now"

emajor

Oh man, don't those people make you nuts? They know they are just going to slow down again at the next curve and yet they still speed up so no one can get around.

legacygt

No "beast under the hood" but important to remember that you did get the "big" engine for this car. The Mazda3 also comes with a 2.0L which might have met its match in the mountains.

veedubber86

I love mountain driving in a worthy car. I have a first gen Mazda3i and it's low on power, but it's pretty fun, even in the mountains. My old GLI was better though.

TheKernal

I'm that brother that went out and bought the Mazda 3. I have been very impressed by the performance and since I live in the Foothills west of Denver, there are plenty of curvy roads to put it through its paces . As my brother noted, you never have to stomp on the pedal to get it to downshift and I always feel as if there's plenty of power to spare in the real world of driving, especially if you engage the "Sport" mode. I have very few criticisms of the Mazda 3 (I have the GT version and there are very useful, cool things they've done with radar) but one noticable downside is the road noise. On my commute, it's generally pretty quiet at highway speeds until you hit that one stretch of old pavement (ok, it's on eastbound 6th Avenue!) and suddenly I can hardly hear a thing over the road noise. On the upside, the cruise control is outstanding and is finally a feature that is something I'd really miss if my next didn't have it. Basically, you set it for a higher speed than you normally would drive and if someone pulls in front of you, it keeps your distance constant. If someone speeds up, you keep pace with the car ahead of you and you can even set the distance you follow the car in front of you in four increments. For now, I've turned off the Lane Departure Warning System since I don't really like getting notified every time I get near or cross the lane markings but the cross traffic warning has saved my bacon many times backing out of a parking space.