Realigned and rebuilt my shifter assembly, and swapped the rubber shift mount bushings for a few washers epoxied together. This is no easy thing to get to on a 5 with a rear center console - some of those fasteners are in really awful places.
Anyway, it's never been quite right. Tore it apart and regreased it, tightened up the shifter mounts, replaced some rubber that was starting to perish (on the shift centering spring) and it seems vastly improved. Anyone who's having issues getting into 1/2/R regularly on a 6mt - there is a Mazda3 TSB that covers this exact problem (05-007/13, "HARD TO SHIFT INTO GEARS") and the fix is the same.
Ruby
Anyway, it's never been quite right. Tore it apart and regreased it, tightened up the shifter mounts, replaced some rubber that was starting to perish (on the shift centering spring) and it seems vastly improved. Anyone who's having issues getting into 1/2/R regularly on a 6mt - there is a Mazda3 TSB that covers this exact problem (05-007/13, "HARD TO SHIFT INTO GEARS") and the fix is the same.
Ruby