The Mazda MX-5 has lost weight. I have not

A BIT like those village fete competitions where you have to guess how many pickles really are in the jar, every petrolhead and his dog are trying to work out how many ounces Mazda really has shaved off the new MX-5.

It’s an important question, largely because the prize, rather unlike a village fete, isn’t a bottle of wine or a weekend for two in Cleethorpes. It’s the promise of what could be the most exciting new car you’ll drive next year. 

Mazda itself is being coy for now as to just how much of a Gillian McKeith regime its two-seater roadster has been through. It won’t say exactly how much weight the new fourth-generation car has lost over its predecessor, only that it’s ‘more than 100kg’ lighter than the car that went before it.

When you do the maths that means the latest car will weigh at tops 1,053kg – or 2,321 pounds to you, Mr Farage – but probably less. All of which means it’ll be tantalisingly close to what the original weighed in at when it was launched 25 years ago – and the new car will have more power to play with too!

Why, you might be wondering, do a few pounds and ounces matter here and there, particularly when you’ll freely admit you can’t fit into the skinny jeans you wore a quarter of a century ago? It’s important because I’ve held my ground in pub debates for the last three years that the MX-5 is the best small sports car ever made.

The reason why it is the best-selling roadster the world’s ever seen is largely because it offers up the previously unthinkable combination of Triumph Spitfire fun with Toyota Yaris reliability. It is the darling of motoring journalists everywhere largely because it is beltingly good fun – and it’s why I’m on my second, having very reluctantly sold the first one.

It’s also important for the wider car industry as a whole because – as any eco-friendly car company exec will tell you – weight is the enemy, blunting performance and meaning you have to kill more polar bears with exhaust fumes to make up the shortfall. Making the new MX-5 lighter at a time when the trend is making cars ever heavier is an important example to the car world of less being more.

In fact, the MX-5 brings with it only one real problem. Being so light means any excess weight you’re carrying will only undermine its own brilliance – what’s the point of shaving the equivalent of a fat mate off the car’s weight when taking a fat mate along for the ride will cancel all Mazda’s hard work out?

It’s a good thing it’ll be long after Christmas before the new MX-5 lands here. The post-festive diet will have kicked in by then!