Mazda CX-7: who loves you, baby?
cj hubbard writes:
Peter came in yesterday, ranting and raving a little bit about how much he didn’t like the Mazda CX-7 we’ve currently got out on test loan. The ride is terrible, he said, the cabin uninspired, the sills weirdly high when you’re getting in, the gearbox odd – aside from the pretty decent 2.2-litre 173hp turbodiesel engine, why would you?
This came as something of a surprise. Back when it had un-pc turbo petrol powarrrr, the CX-7 always stuck me as an intriguing alternative SUV – yes, as in it probably listens to death metal and dresses up lots in black – with the best high-rise handling this side of a BMW X5. Could Mazda have really cocked it up so badly with the mid-life refresh? Gorky grinning frontal facelift aside.
So last night and this morning it was my turn with the keys. And respectfully – Peter is my boss, after all – I find myself tending to disagree.
Sure, the ride is somewhat firm and fairly fidgety. The sills are high to step over when you’re getting in, now you come to mention it. And the canted over windscreen pillars do rather give you the sensation you’re piloting a shuttle away from Star Trek’s USS Enterprise (the wildly neon blue and red dials in the instrument cluster only adding to the effect).
But Mazda set out to build a sporty SUV here. It ain’t no MX-5 – that’s a given. But it is kind of fast.
Deceptively so, actually. The CX-7 carries itself forward with such effortless ease, glancing at the speedo is occasionally akin to a poke in the eye, the 2.2d under the hood conspiring with the confusingly car-like dynamics to totally fool your velocity senses. I had a bizarre experience on the way home, where I came up behind a Porsche Cayenne and didn’t recognise it as a 4×4; the CX-7 had come to feel so much like driving a regular car my perception was all skewed and the Cayenne seemed much smaller than it really is.
I have no idea how Mazda has done that to the chassis. It’s like you’re going round corners in a sports saloon, but are somehow two feet further off the ground. I know it does generate bodyroll, because it was chucking my gear about in the boot (sorry bananas), but everything is so fluid the process of driving the CX-7 quickly happens like a natural event. I even like the oily weightlessness of the steering, and the lengthy throw of the haptically mechanical six-speed ‘box.
I don’t know. Maybe I’m still all chilled out from Finland; perhaps hacking around on a frozen lake going very sideways in Porsche Panameras has some kind of pacifying effect…
[PS: Wayne, don’t worry – an Infiniti FX blog is coming.]
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Links:
First Drive: Mazda CX-7 (2009 onwards model)
On Test: Mazda CX-7 (2007 onwards model)
Time to test those snow driving skills, CJ…
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Mazda, CX-7, turbodiesel, SUV, 4×4, difference of opinion, On the Road, In the car park, MSN Cars, Inside Track
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Posted: February 16th, 2010 under On the Road.
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