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Mazda RX-3 restomod makes Leno scream, us cheer

The Mazda RX-3 Savanna was the rotary-engined version of the Mazda 808 Grand Familia. Sold in the US from 1971 to 1978, the little Japanese fastback earned a reputation as an excellent racecar, winning events all over the world. A racing connection is how a fantastic 1973 restomod example owned by Savant Young made its way to Jay Leno's Garage. Young said that when he was a boy his uncle used to street race an RX-3, and Young liked how the RX-3 sounded and the fact that a tiny import could go up against and beat big V8s of the time. Leno admitted that he has no connection to the RX-3, saying it's not the kind of car he typically likes. But he liked Young's custom update so much that when he saw the coupe sitting outside the Petersen Museum in Los Angeles, he waited for the owner to show up. Young's changes over the 15 years he's owned the car include dropping in the rotary engine and running gear from the second-generation Mazda RX-7, bridge-ported and methane injected. At 15 pounds of boost he says it's putting out about 400 horsepower. The rear end comes from a Toyota Hilux half-ton pickup, to help put all that power down in a car that weighs maybe 2,100 pounds. The color is taken from the Lamborghini palette. Disc brakes all around, 14-inchers up front, control the velocity. Nothing controls the gas mileage, said to be "maybe 12 mpg." And nothing could stop Leno from whooping it up during the driver. Check out the fun in the video above.

Edmunds ranks the best used cars for 2013

When people ask us what car we would recommend for them, it's usually not easy to answer. To make a useful recommendation we must consider which of the numerous vehicle segments fits their needs best, and then choose one of the many vehicles offered in each segment. For some people, new cars don't meet their expectations of value, because they lose so much of it the moment they are purchased and driven off the dealer lot. For them, there's always the used-car market, where great deals can be found, but cars' histories of reliability and maintenance records - and perhaps that Certified Pre-Owned warranty - become ever-important factors playing into purchase choice.
To help out, Edmunds has done us the favor of assembling a list of the best used vehicles money can buy, covering model years 2006-2011, according to what it considers the most important criteria when shopping for used autos: reliability, safety, value and availability. That means unreliable, unsafe, super-expensive or limited-edition models don't appear on the list, but instead cars from each segment that are more likely to satisfy the general population.
There are some real goodies on the list, including but not limited to vehicles such as the capable Honda Fit, the cultish Honda Accord coupe (which can be had with a 240-horsepower V6 and a six-speed manual transmission some years), and the powerful Chevrolet Corvette. While Edmunds' choice of the Volvo C70 for best used convertible baffled us at first (not that it's a bad car), it redeemed itself by stating that the Mazda MX-5 still is an unofficial top choice if you don't require more than two seats.

2016 Mazda2 won't come to the US

Hoping to get your hands on the new Mazda2? Don't get your hopes up too high, because the latest word has it that the new hatchback won't be available in the United States. According to the report from Automotive News, Mazda's US office has decided against bringing the new Mazda2 to American showrooms. This despite it being made just south of the border in Salamanca, Mexico. The reasons are apparently two-fold. For starters, Mazda sales offices around the world have been clamoring for larger allotments of the new 2, and the company can only supply so many. "We could have had it, but we would have had a number that didn't make much sense with 600 dealers and with the marketing it takes to launch a new car," Robert Davis, Mazda's senior VP of US sales operations, told AN. For another, Mazda is apparently not convinced the new supermini would resonate with US buyers, who are increasingly migrating towards crossovers. So Mazda is focusing instead on "products that make us and our dealers considerably more profit than a Mazda2 does." That doesn't mean the latest Mazda2 will be entirely out of our reach forever, though. The company's agreement with Toyota will see a sedan version sold in the US as the Scion iA. Mazda is also certifying it to US safety and environmental standards so that it can sell the 2 in Puerto Rico, which means that it wouldn't take much to change course and bring the hatchback into the US in the future: "It'll always be there if we need it," Davis told AN. Reached for comment, a spokesman for Mazda's North American operations told Autoblog that "The Mazda2 launch in the U.S. market is on hold in order to evaluate the B-Car segment and enable us the opportunity to focus on the launches of the refreshed Mazda6 and CX-5, and the all-new MX-5 roadster and CX-3 subcompact crossover SUV." That leaves the aforementioned CX-3 - which is, incidentally, based on the same architecture as the Mazda2 - as the smallest mainstream model that Mazda will offer Stateside.