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Petrolicious lets a 1971 Mazda RX-2 howl

Rotary engines scream to the heavens in the best way possible. To hear a wonderful example of the Wankel's battle cry, turn up your speakers and watch Petrolicious highlight an immaculately clean 1971 Mazda RX-2 in Australia. Owner Jason Humble took three years to build his RX-2 from a bare shell, and he started competing with it in vintage racing in 2005. The little coupe's class pits it on track against Mustangs and Camaros, but Humble claims that he's regularly near the top of the pack thanks to the Mazda's communicative chassis. We don't get to see the RX-2 mixing things up on track in the Petrolicious video, but Humble does treat us to a drive through the Australian countryside. He's happy to let the coupe's rotary rev, and the little engine is capable of making a wonderful noise. It's great to see Petrolicious continue to give the spotlight to these sometimes overlooked classic Japanese sports cars.

Aussie Mazda MX-5 Miata specs leak suggests power loss

Mazda's 2016 MX-5 Miata reveal didn't include much in the way of specifications, but the car's debut seems to have blown the lid off of the rumormill, with the latest word out of Australia including fresh claims of curb weight and engine output.
Before delving into the findings from Motoring.com, we're going to take a moment to find a few grains of salt. It's not that we don't trust the Oz publication, it's just that we wouldn't be surprised to learn their car's specifications will vary from that of our eventual North American car.
Of course, we don't expect the footprint of the new ND model to itself to differ much - it will still be the most compact Miata ever - overall length is expected to check in at just over 154 inches - that's about 1.4 inches shorter than the original NA Miata and over 4 inches shorter than today's NC generation, yet it'll ride atop a longer wheelbase and be slightly wider while sitting lower to the ground.

2019 Mazda3 pricing starts at over $20,000, 2.5-liter engine standard

Pricing for the 2019 Mazda3 hatchback and sedan has been announced, and the base price has gone up by about $3,000. The new cheapest model is a front-drive, automatic Mazda3 sedan, and it starts at $21,895. The base Mazda3 now has the 186-horsepower 2.5-liter 4-cylinder as the standard engine, whereas the old model came with a 155-horsepower 2.0-liter engine and manual transmission as standard. Compared like-to-like, a 2018 Mazda3 in a similar spec would be slightly more expensive ($22,035) than the 2019 model. Opting for the hatchback on the base trim adds an additional level of equipment, with 18-inch wheels instead of 16-inch ones, Apple CarPlay and Android Auto, dual automatic climate control, leather wrapped steering wheel and shift knob. It also gets more safety equipment including blind-spot monitoring, automatic emergency braking, radar cruise control, automatic high-beams, automatic wipers and lane-departure warning with lane-keep assist. That all adds up to a $2,600 price increase over a base sedan. These features are available on the sedan for an extra $1,600 in the form of the Select package. For all other trims, opting for the hatchback adds $1,000. Higher trim levels add features such as better sound systems, real leather, a sunroof, heads-up display and power heated seats. In addition to pricing, Mazda revealed drivetrain options for the Mazda3, and they're not great for fans of manual transmissions. The Mazda3 hatchback with front-wheel drive and Premium trim is the only manual offering, and it starts at $28,395. On the upside, at least Mazda isn't relegating manual transmissions to the stripped out versions, but on the downside, there isn't a cheap manual option for those on a budget. And of course, if you want the sedan or all-wheel drive, the six-speed automatic is your only choice. Mazda has told us that it could match a manual with all-wheel drive, but clearly it doesn't see a market for that in the U.S. But like with the addition of the turbocharged Mazda6 and CX-5, if there's demand, such a combination could become available, but keep in mind the odds will still be slim. You can see the full breakdown of trims and prices below. The 2019 Mazda3 will be available in March.