Most people who have considered a motorsports hobby know how awesome of a car the Miata is for this purpose. It is simple, light, 50/50 weight, cheap, reliable, not a lot of work to maintain, etc. And its one of the most fun cars to take out for an afternoon and beat on. Not a huge surprise that the SCCA created a Spec Miata racing class.
But, I’m continually impressed at how violently people on the internet fail when it comes to these cars. Here are some excerpts from a thread on http://nw3s.org/forum/ (registration required and its not worth your time)
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“Track car? You mean Miata’s are good auto-X cars. The reason there is a Miata spec class is because Miata’s can’t compete with other cars, so they only race themselves.”
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Well I’ve never given a miata any thought whatsoever and only considered them inexpensive cars for girls that want a ’sport’ car. I mean really, 1.8L and 140HP? Comparing to a stock 320hp AWD AWS 3S? Night and Day to me.”
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“Sure, they can be fixed up. One could fix up a Geo Metro too (aren’t they about the same cost as a miata? Under 20k anyway)….but WHY?”
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“If you see a Miata passing a Vette it’s because the vette driver can’t drive, or a huge build-up of the Miata (hey anything can be fast with enough money), but that is not the norm.”
Like in all things, its great knowing how the world actually works, and looking down (with glee) on the ignorant masses.
on January 10, 2007 at 11:43 pm sammage wrote:
Ignorance must be bliss to them…this almost seems like the mis-information of LS1tech has manifest itself on a 3S board.
on February 14, 2007 at 3:41 pm Man wrote:
Miatas are the perfect car for your website. Since they are for either girls or pansies it makes sense you would drive one. No one with half a brain would listen to anything someone named ‘pansy patrol’ would say anyway. I’ll bet the forum you quoted got rid of you in a hurry since they are probably guys and not pansies, lol. Sounds like crying and sour grapes to me.
Enjoy your pansy cars……hahaha.
on February 14, 2007 at 3:47 pm Henry wrote:
Well, the Miata is the #1 most tracked car in the world. And tracking a car is awesome. So if having a car designed for the track is pansy, then I accept this new meaning for pansy patrol!
– Henry
on February 14, 2007 at 4:31 pm Noah wrote:
I think you just proved our point and your failure, all at the same time. Thanks!
By the way, I’d be happy to race you around a track sometime in my Miata. I think you’ll be surprised at how vicious my “pansy” car is.
on June 4, 2007 at 2:41 pm Mike wrote:
After living on road courses every summer for the last 4 years I thought I’d share my dissenting opinion on miatas. Yes, they’re quite nimble around corners, cheap, and great to learn on because horsepower can’t hide a bad corner, but all the downsides don’t make up for these features. In my humble opinion these are the downsides:
-The lack of horsepower makes them moving pylons on the straightaways which is why they’re usually in a separate run group with other underpowered cars such as 944’s. That’s not fun to me. I love powering out of a corner and warping towards the next brake zone. Sure it’s great putting together a couple of corners and finding that Z06 that had been trying to claim your rear bumper for GM has now fallen back 10 cars. But pulling alongside the PO-ed owner of a brand-new GT3 and giving the driver a wave at 140mph is waaaay more fun. How many times has a “super-car” owner found you in the pits and asked what you’ve done to your car?
-Unfortunately, you must be under 5′10″ to comfortably ride the car. The Japanese expression jinba ittai meaning the oneness of motion, “rider and horse as one,” was the focus of the MX-5 Miata concept. Well at 6′1″ I feel like Andre the Giant riding a pony.
-The style of competitive racing these cars is a little too NASCAR for me. They bump-draft running trains on the unfortunate car(s) left in the wind. They stick their bumper into eachother’s rear quarters on every turn. They late-brake, dive-bomb, and run eachother off track. Every spec miata I see on the track has at least one body panel painted by rattle-can or their sponsored by a collision repair shop. By the end of the day one or two are totalled and all of them have black circles on their sides. I’ll go drive a go-kart if I want to do that.
Now the real deal-breaker for me:
-The droning sound of the spec miata muffler is so annoying I’ve seen the woodland creatures crawl out of the trees convulsing on the ground in the throes of agony. OK, not quite, but it’s not a pleasant sound. Most miata guys I’ve talked to either wear ear plugs or their deaf. This flaw is what really pulls my hate towards the surface. I’ve stood at Canada Corner at Road America, 40 yards from the edge of the track, and had to halt my conversation while the angry bees pass by. No other cars, even the big-bore American Iron cars, create as much noise. And if it only sounded nice, it’d be excusable. But no, the bleet is very akin to the 5 inch pumpkin shooters I see on ricers.
I don’t doubt you and others enjoy the car. The miata is simply a love-it or hate-it car.
on June 4, 2007 at 10:20 pm Noah wrote:
Mike, you seem to be missing the point of Miatas entirely. I like my Miata because it is incredibly responsive and predictable, easy to drive, fun to drive, easy and cheap to maintain, and a car that I can comfortably drive at the limit on a track all day long. Don’t get me wrong, I’d love for 500hp just as much as the next guy, but it is how a car behaves in the corners that will always be paramount. Miatas are responsive, predictable, pure. They are, sorry to use the cliche, like an extension of yourself. You don’t have to worry about overcoming or working around any handling deficiencies, as it has none.
It’s only “deficiency” is power, but really, if you are road racing, your interests should be in the corners, not the straightaways. Such enthusiasm for straightaways belongs more in oval and drag racing - I can’t even remember the last time I discussed a straightaway with someone at a track day. We might compare top speeds at the end of a straight, but that isn’t really a discussion of the straight, more a comparison of either power or exit speed. Real interest lies in the line that other racers find best through the corners.
As for your other qualms with the Miata, I don’t really see how they would affect a Miata’s track-worthiness. The space issue can be a concern in stock form, but at 6 feet even, I fit perfectly in my Miata. If you require more room, just buy a racing seat and bolt it to the floor (this is a track car, after all).
Spec Miata racing really has nothing to do with Miatas, and everything to do with that racing class. Everything you have described is simply the product of very intense competition and, if you are racing, why wouldn’t you want the race to be competitive? And such techniques and incidents are not unique to Spec Miata racing, as evidence by this failed maneuver that I witnessed:
http://www.pansypatrol.com/people/noah/pictures/Spin%20Out%20at%20Big%20Bend%20.jpg
The “real deal-breaker” for you is the sound of a Spec Miata Muffler? Surely you must be joking? The MUFFLER??? Now you’re not even talking about a semi-street car, but a FULLY RACE PREPPED track car. The sound of a race car’s muffler is about as important as the color of its rims. Not to mention that Spec Miatas are only one type of Miata, and a very specialized one at that. If anything, all the other exhausts I have heard suffer from being too QUIET. But, once again, I don’t drive cars because they sound pretty. I drive them because they are a pleasure to drive hard.
But, if you must insist on the importance of exhaust tone, I must once again disagreee with you. I went to a Porsche Clash at The Glen a few years ago, and there were dozens of Porsche 911s with a 1 foot exhaust pipe. Thats 1 foot from the turbo straight to the back of the car. To say that they were loud and whiny is an understatement. A Spec Miata isn’t even in the same ballpark for noise output. None of that really matters though, because any open exhaust has that ring of performance and purpose to it that trumps all else. And if I must make the judgment, the worst exhaust note I have heard on a track car was on a street-legal M3. Incredibly loud and farty, and not any faster than a regular M3.
It seems your main problem with Miatas is that they are underpowered. They are underpowered, but if that is your yardstick than you don’t understand. I have been in a Lingenfelter Corvette at Limerock. It puts down 750hp, and the car rocketed to 150mph at Lime Rock. And the front straight at Lime Rock is TINY. But you know what the most insane car I have been in was? A 1970s Porsche 911 Whale Tail. It had been lightened to 2100 pounds, and “only” made 310 hp. It was quick, but not the quickest car I’ve been in. The deciding factor was its rock solid suspension, and insane tires. It had racing rubber all around, 275s in the front and 315s in the rear. It stuck more than anything else I have ever been in in the corners. And that is why we road race. Because it is TURNING that is exciting. The straights are just a moment for us to relax before the next corner.
on June 4, 2007 at 11:38 pm Chris wrote:
Honestly, from the driving perspective Miatas impress me most because they are an ultimately simple expression of driving. Are they the best car? I’d be hard-pressed to support that, but they could be considered the best car for someone looking to get into racing on a budget. Clint’s most recent article details what is so much fun about driving a slow car.
I’ve had hot laps in a well-dialed, well-driven spec miata with 700# springs and serious slicks, followed by a C6 Z06 with a brake upgrade and slicks. My experience in the Miata was a much more intense one. I’ll admit that one driver may have pushed harder than the other, but I could be endlessly content trying to sharpen my skills in the slower car. I will return to the wisdom that “It’s better to drive a slow car fast than it is to drive a fast car slow”.
Mind-numbingly fast cars are absolutely fun in their own right, and there is a certain enjoyment to eating up straights a little too quickly, but it just isn’t necessary to my track driving experience. I’m not Ayrton Senna. I will never be, no matter how much racing experience I try to accumulate. Personal betterment at my driving hobby is all that I can hope to accomplish, and in that context finding the most raw, land-missile track car is not very helpful. Besides, time and money spent on making a car brake and turn can always be maximized later with a turbo kit. Anybody who needs and can afford a track car faster than a turbo Miata needs to have their head checked, or should make a generous contribution to my leisure fund.
I can agree with you about one thing, however; Spec Miatas sound like hell. They sound almost as bad as mufflerless non-turbo Porsches.
on November 23, 2008 at 11:09 am Anon wrote:
Rear wheel drive, low weight 2 seater, unequal A-arm suspension, LSD equipped car with a 50/50 weight distribution. There is a reason that the Miata kicks the crap out of nearly everything on the autocross course.
A similar value is to be found in the Toyota MR2 Spyder. If you haven’t driven a mid-engined car, then you owe it to yourself. Whether it is an old Lotus Europa, a Toyota MR2, or the NSX, they all share a delightfully neutral feel. A big part of it is the low polar moment of inertia. Porsches Miatas, and Corvettes manage to achieve a balanced weight, more or less, by putting heavy stuff on both ends of the car. However, with all that weight so far from the center of mass, the car ends up with a high polar moment of inertia and will resist twisting. Mid-engined cars keep the weight in the middle and are much easier to guide through twisty sections of road.
The Toyota MR2 Spyder can be every bit the track car the Miata is, if not more, yet nobody here mentions it. In terms of cost both cars are nearly the same. What both cars lack is a hardtop model which would improve autocross performance due to enhanced chassis rigidity, reduce weight, and provide greater crash protection.
on November 23, 2008 at 6:31 pm Chris wrote:
Good point on what should be a well-handling car. I have to disagree with you on cost, however.
The Miata was produced as essentially the same car from 1990 to 2005. The MR2 Spyder was produced only from 2000 to 2005. This makes the cheapest MR2 Spyder you are likely to find? $7000-8000 (if you can find one at all, as I’ll bring up in a minute). The cheapest Miata you are likely to find? About $1000. Inexpensive is usually the name of the game if you’re talking about building a track car or buying a second, “fun” car. Granted, $7-8k isn’t exactly a whopping large amount of money, and there are plenty of people who own Boxters as fun cars, but cost certainly makes a difference to me.
Secondly, there are also some 330,000 Miatas running around out there, not including the new generation which started production in 2006. The best estimates I can get on US MR Spyder production numbers are under 30,000. While they shouldn’t be too much more expensive than a Miata in theory, they are very hard to find and sell for a premium if you can find one at all.
I can hear the protest now: “what about the old MR2″? The 2nd-gen MR2 was available in the US from 1991 to 1995, during which time they sold 15,705 of them. In other words, the MKII MR2 is about 20x less common than the Miata, and that makes them both impossible to find, and command an unreasonably high price in the marketplace.
Any way you slice it, an MR2 or MR Spyder is much more difficult to get your hands on than a Miata. Even without that, the difference in parts availability and enthusiast user base makes for a much stronger case in favor of the Miata.
Thanks for taking the time to weigh in!
on December 14, 2008 at 7:45 pm Anon wrote:
1. The Blue Book Values year for year the Miata and MR2 Spyder are about the same. They really do not sell for a premium. If anything people seem prefer the Miata because it is familiar to them. Both are rather reliable cars.
2. Year for year the Miata sold about 3x-4x as many units.
3. In today’s internet age it is not very hard to find a MR2 Spyder; in fact I see them for sale regularly. You say it is a very hard car to find with about 23,868 sold. Lets compare:
Production run numbers for Japanese Sports Cars / US Models Only
Acura NSX 7,421 (1991 thru 1998)
Toyota Supra 11,239
Mazda RX7 FD3S 13,879 Only the 1993–1995 model years were sold in the U.S. and Canada.
Acura Integra Type R 3,500 (approx.)
The Toyota MR2 Spyder ZZW30 sold 7,233 units in its debut year, falling to just 121 for the 2005 model, for a total of 23,868 through its six years of production in the US
4. TRD and the aftermarket support MR2 Spyders. The cost of parts is pretty similar to what you would find for Miatas.
5. I could build up a 1989 MR2 just as easily as a 1991 Miata if you want to go back that far.
6. On price, it is relative; a MR2 Spyder build will be less than buying a Lotus Elise. http://www.sportcompactcarweb.com/features/0705_sccp_toyota_mr2_and_lotus_elise/index.html
7. No argument there are more Miata events. However, when building an autocross car a light weight midengined design has distinct advantages which favors the MR2 Spyder.
8. The MR2 has higher door sills and an engine that won’t land on your lap during a frontal crash; safety considerations.
9. MR2 SW20
PRODUCTION
1991: 11,211
1992: 6,188
1993: 2,917
1994: 908
1995: 356
21.5k total