The Mazdaspeed 3 is just one in a long line of quick, powerful small Mazdas. Hit the way-back button to the 1971 model year and there is the R100 — a truly small car with 100 horsepower from its rotary engine at a time when other small cars had 60 hp or less.
Fast-forward to 1988 and there's the 323 GTX with a turbocharger hanging off its four-cylinder engine and all-wheel drive using the resulting 132 hp to great effect. Throw on another 15 years and there's the 2003 Mazdaspeed Protégé with 170 hp on tap from its turbo-4. By the time the Mazdaspeed 3 finally showed up as a 2007 model, Mazda had this quick little car thing down solidly.
The formula for the Mazdaspeed 3 is straightforward and as old as the muscle car. Mazda simply took the, at the time, smallest car it sold in America, the front-drive Mazda 3 five-door hatchback, and shoved a more powerful engine from its larger vehicles into it. That engine, in the original Mazdaspeed 3's case, was the 2.3-liter direct-injection, turbocharged and intercooled MZR inline four-cylinder. It's the same engine Mazda uses in some crossover SUVs and it's backed by a six-speed manual transmission in the Mazdaspeed 3.
Though Mazda has some experience with all-wheel drive, with the first Mazdaspeed 3 it stuck with front-wheel drive and the combination of a sophisticated limited-slip differential with traction control and stability control. The combination of the engine's broad torque curve and the Mazda 3's supple chassis was electrifying, and the Mazdaspeed 3 immediately leapt to the forefront of the small performance car pack.
The Mazda 3 was seriously updated for the 2009 model year and the Mazdaspeed 3 moved into the new shell for 2010. While the second Mazdaspeed 3 retained the same basic drivetrain and chassis, revisions to the engine control computer and suspension resulted in an even more generous power band and significantly improved handling. The second Mazdaspeed 3 simply obliterated the competition at its modest price point.
There's no way to know what the future of the Mazdaspeed 3 may be. But considering all the possibilities, it's easy to get giddy while speculating.
