AJAC 2003 Car of the Year Competition

Automotive Journalists Association of Canada (AJAC) runs an annual competition for the best new car for the year (available in Canada). Sometimes, its selection of new cars are suspect (e.g. SX2.0 aka re-named Neon, but no Focus SVT).

However, the process is rigorous and relatively fair (60 journalists assembled at the Shannonville Racetrack for 4-5 days of testing).

It ran its competition last weekend. The objective numbers are posted here http://www.ajac.ca/CL/AJAC/AJAC.nsf/web/COTTY2003TestData
In the Performance testing, the MSP did :
0-62 mph/100 kmh: 7.52 sec
80-120 kph/50-75mph: 5.72 sec
100 kph/62 mph-0: 127 ft/38.8 m.

Check out the handling/feel ratings in the Dynamics testing, and the MSP's competition at the website. Category competitors are Civic SiR (Si USA), Cooper S, Tiburon, Eclipse GTP, and Saab 9.3 Linear.

The subjective write-up for the MSP's category (best Sports Coupe/Sedan < $35,000 CAD) will be printed this Saturday, and the winner of the category announced Nov 21.

BTW, did anyone see a recent episode of Motoring 2003?

The report I heard is:
"They ended up giving it 4 wheels (the maximum) in the categories (performance, touchy-feely, handling - I think those are the categories), and 3 or 3-1/2 wheels for safety and 3 or 3-1/2 wheels for value. Pretty good rating, I'd say. They loved the pop out stereo too."

Hey!.
I saw the recent eposide of Motoring 2003!
In fact, i have it on tape too!.
I beleive it's going to be on again, tonight if anyone reads this post before midnight tonight...it's airing on TSN again.

Anyway, it was the first time i saw the head unit flip open like that..i thought it was really cool!.

Anyway, the rates is in fact out of 5 wheels. Not 4.
So, the MS-P didn't score perfect in any of the categories.
But even so, i doesn't matter.... Those are all personally opinions. We certainly will have our own too, once we get ours.

Btw, i'm still very upset that we, Canadians, will not be getting the 'Mazdaspeed' Embroided mats!!!!!!!:'(

Tx for clarifying. What's with story with the mats?

I think your just gettin the base protege mats?

Limited Edition said:

Btw, i'm still very upset that we, Canadians, will not be getting the 'Mazdaspeed' Embroided mats!!!!!!!:'(

Click to expand...

why wont the canadians get them? any specific reason? you could always buy em from a US dealer if thats true, and you really really wanted them. maybe even ebay, ive seen MP3 mats up thre.

Well it isn't a Fact that us, Canadians will not be getting the 'Mazdaspeed' Mats. If you look under RSX's thread about the 2 MS-P sightings in Montreal, in one of those pictures you can see that, the owner has the regular 'protege' embroided mats..
This happen to the Mp3's that we got in Canada back in 2001!!!
As a true Limited Edition car, i believe that we should get a truely unique mat as well...

So, tell me, who exactly is keep these mats away from the consumer? Does it really come with 'MAZDASPEED' Mats, but just that the dealerships decide to take them away, and askes for an additional charge? I think if thise is true, it's totally robbery!!

We better we getting the cargo net as a standard feature as well... or else, there is some serious issues that Mazda has to deal with.(flame)