Mazda MX-5 30th Anniversary 2019 UK first drive

Special editions are a way to show a wider audience what might be done, surely? Isn’t it a shame when they’re mostly about a new paint colour? As it happens, there’s a way that you could turn this car into something more like the birthday present it really ought to have been, and you needn’t even leave the Mazda showroom to do it. We’ll come to that.

The fourth-generation MX-5 got a glowing four-and-a-half star road test recommendation from us when it landed in the UK in 2015, proving lighter, purer and more involving than any version since the very first – and it has been improved significantly since then. Last year, Mazda released an updated car with a more powerful and freer-revving 2.0-litre motor and a few choice interior and equipment updates – and it’s these revisions chiefly that make the 30th Anniversary car appeal a little more than some MX-5s have over the years. Really, they’re the reasons that might convince you that now is the time to chop in your older sports car – even if it was the lurid paint that initially caught your eye.

The orange-trimmed Recaro seats are attractive, usefully well bolstered and finished in tactile Alcantara, although this tester found the cushions a touch uncomfortably narrow. There’s Alcantara suede on the gearlever gaiter, too, and on the handbrake, as well as on the dashboard. It certainly adds an upmarket note to an interior that can feel slightly plasticky and unspecial on lower-grade models.

The 2.0-litre motor sounds a bit dull and unsporting at low revs, but it spins sweetly enough, and when it gets beyond 4000rpm, it gives the MX-5 a turn of foot that now feels hot hatch quick through second and third gears. It also spins all the way to 7500rpm now, combining as encouragingly as ever with the car’s beautifully positive and tactile manual gearbox but enlivening that delicately responsive chassis all the more for its extra forcefulness – and so it rewards you vividly every time the road opens up and you can keep your toe in.

The Sport-spec springs and dampers and those Rays forged wheels make for a ride and handling compromise that’s well suited to a compact, lightweight sports car, and that works well on UK country lanes. Even thus equipped, the MX-5 still isn’t the stiffest or the most agile rear-driver on the block. Its chassis retains enough suspension travel to deal fluently with bigger inputs; its grip level is chosen for a progressive breakaway rather than for the utmost outright adhesion; and it has handling that likes to communicate the load building into the tyres with gently gathering body roll, as the driver is made to work a little harder for his kicks than some modern two-seaters might oblige. In all of those respects, the MX-5 driving experience remains an old-school sporting one even in 2019, but it’s still outstandingly involving and likeable.

For customers looking to make a few aftermarket tweaks to the specification of their cars, Mazda now offers a few selected, dealer-fit upgrades to the MX-5 that really do make a telling difference to the way it handles and performs. There’s a lightweight BBS 17in alloy wheel that doesn’t look unlike the Rays rim on the 30th Anniversary car; an Eibach suspension lowering kit that drops the chassis 25mm lower to the ground; and a sports exhaust that boosts the car’s audible character to truly sporting levels. You could have the lot on a Sport Nav car, with an otherwise matching spec to the 30th Anniversary edition save for the front brakes, and in a nicer metallic colour, for the same price. In fact, there would be change to spend on 'go-faster' body trim if you so chose.

Mazda had an MX-5 2.0-litre with the dealer-fit lowering kit, the sports exhaust and the BBS wheels squirrelled away in a corner on the 30th Anniversary edition UK press launch, and a test drive proved, rather inconveniently perhaps, that it’s a noticably quicker, freer-revving, more precise and keener-handling prospect than any factory-spec Mazda MX-5. There’s a slightly more compelling sense of sporting purpose about it – even if it doesn’t have quite as smooth a low-speed ride as the Sport-spec car. Lowering the MX-5 was always the first thing aftermarket tuners did to it; no surprise, then, that it makes an already engaging chassis even more involving and special.

So, given that all of those dealer accessories are now fully warranted Mazda upgrades, you can guess where my money would go – and it wouldn’t be on that orange paint job. But I’m not a member of the MX-5 fan club; and I gather they like a special edition. It would, of course, be possible to fit the Eibach lowering kit and sports pipes to a 30th Anniversary car; and given special editions hold their value so well, it wouldn’t be an entirely daft way to spend £28,095, either.

So there you are, folks: go nuts, there's cake for all, to have and to eat, exactly as you prefer. Happy 30th, MX-5. Kool & The Gang, that’s your cue.

Mazda MX-5 30th Anniversary specification

Where Warwickshire, UK Price £28,095 On sale Now Engine 4cyls inline, 1998cc, normally aspirated, petrol Power 181bhp at 7000rpm Torque 151lb ft at 4000rpm Gearbox 6-spd manual Kerb weight 1124kg Top speed 136mph 0-62mph 6.5sec Fuel economy 40.9mpg (WLTP combined) CO2 tbc Rivals Toyota GT86, Nissan 370Z