BMW X5 / Mazda MX-5 | Test Drive | Auto Class Magazine

BMW X5 / Mazda MX-5 | Test Drive

4 January 2020 Redazione News, Stories, Tested

Coming down from one and jump on the other is like pressing a giant button that turns an experience more focused on the exaltation of emotions (the Mazda) to an experience built around a substantially perfect engineering success (the BMW).

Words by Alessandro Marrone / Photo by Andy Williams

Suddenly the road in front of us opens up and lets the incredible basin of vegetation and bare rock extend as far as the eye can see, but it is not possible for me to remain glued to the exhausts of the X5 that precedes me because its impressive size completely covers every minimum chance of seeing the following curve. Moreover, the debris raised by its immense wheels are always ready to intimidate the immaculate body of the MX-5, not to mention the fact that I am traveling with the roof folded down. It might seem like the mouse chasing the cat – a big cat indeed – but in reality the little Mazda “Miata” and the latest incarnation of the first SUV of the Bavarian brand (if not the first in the history of contemporary cars) share an escape from daily monotony, where the most traditional patterns are overturned and everything is reduced to the purest pleasure of driving. That’s why the specific power of the 3-liter white mastodon does not necessarily mean that the fight will be unequal, as long as this would end up in a fight. After all that’s not what we’ve planned in the meeting room, putting side by side two diametrically opposed cars with names divided only by an “X” and a timid dash. MX-5 and X5, nothing more different, but still two fundamental cars for their brands, situated at the antipodes of the evolutionary scale and in any case capable of excelling in their own segment, representing in all respects a standard so much imitated as never fully achieved by the others.

Exiting the motorway and leaving behind every remote sign of urban civilization, where I first enjoyed the infinite comfort offered by the wheeled living room represented by the new generation of the BMW SUV, we passed a handful of small towns that, kilometer after kilometer, were becoming small and uninhabited. You realize how far you are driving when you enter places neglected by traditional maps, but the road is the right one because it will soon lead us getting lost and you know very well that to know a car in depth you have to awaken those emotions often numbed by models designed to face the frenzy of urban centers, dedicated to be as functional as the latest appliance advertised on TV, but emotionally aseptic. Not these two though. We aren’t lost, road works made me happy for still sinking on the soft merino leather seats of the X5, limiting myself to observe from the rearview mirror my colleague struggling to close the roof of the Mazda, which thanks to the well-known entirely manual mechanism, takes just a few seconds to go from powder poisoning guaranteed to safe mode.

The X5 is a giant and the metallic Mineral White of the one here accentuates its generous dimensions, as well as the 22-inch double-spoke wheels, also enhancing a reminiscent road behavior of a proper sports car. It must be said that the wheels do not follow the imperfections of the road, but rather absorb every disconnection with surgical precision, allowing a drive style and direction changes unusual for a 175 cm high and 2 meters wide SUV. The weight is consistent as well (2,185 kg) and with a couple of people on board, a full tank of diesel and some luggage in the huge load compartment can easily touch two and a half tons. It is here that the xDrive30d engine peeps out, which as suggested by the now familiar nomenclature used by BMW, provides a 6-cylinder 3-liter turbodiesel capable of delivering 265 horsepower on both axles. Torque, available at just 2,000 rpm, stands at 620 Nm and this translates into an instantaneous thrust as soon as you floor the throttle.

There is a stretch of curves that finally allows the road to widen and the perfect conditions of the asphalt make possible to increase the pace, that thanks to a few minutes of delay accumulated due to works on our way here makes the spasmodic curiosity to reach one of the most scenographic corners of the region clearly palpable by the continuous chats going on through our transceivers. More space to sink the gas does not just mean that the X5 will be able to move better between one curve and the other, because despite today’s MX-5 is the entry level powered by a modest 1.5cc with 131 horses, it just has to move 1,000 kg of weight – or less than half the mass of the BMW – and this means you can really exploit every bit of its vitality. The chassis is a table on which you have two seats, a 6-speed manual gearbox and the steering wheel to which you remain harpooned, soon realizing that a clean ride can also be the most effective, but not for this reason the most fun you can opt for.

The MX-5 is an icon that maintains a recipe of another era, to the detriment of turbocharged fashions and useless gadgets for a youth awkwardly grown up having PlayStation for breakfast. The 4-cylinder naturally aspirated is the ideal companion for life, able to take you for a walk always and in any case, yet ready to transform itself into an instrument of pleasure when you get in tune with a portion of the tachometer that we often forget or we really can’t have. It matters little if the maximum torque is only 150 Nm, because having the opportunity to see the needle climbing up to 7,000 rpm will catapult you into a completely different approach and drive much more spirited than usual. Keeping lower gears, one has the perception of always being beaten in the back, making sure to exploit every single revs at disposal and within a few kilometers, getting in tune with this type of old school driving style, staying glued to the rear bumper of the X5 no longer seems an impossible task to accomplish.

Still some wheel switch, other curves, this time tight between high rock walls and finally we reach today’s long awaited B point. A pristine expanse that nature has created over long years of erosion and other climatic agents begins to take shape in front of us, with a small and almost intimate lake that is jealously embraced by a rock formation that rises all around. The sun shines in the clear sky above our heads and as we approach the cars on the side of the road, we once again realize the incredible difference in size, with the Mazda being literally hidden, as soon as half of the BMW appears in front of it. Then the Red Crystal Soul of the tiny MX-5 is capturing the sun’s rays, varying almost the shades of its red, depending on the angle from which you look at it. This is one of those moments when Andrea and I let ourselves be captivated by that uncontaminated landscape, where the only sound you hear is the delicate rustle of a warm summer wind and the calls of marmots, skilled in camouflaging themselves in the more rocky terrain that rises behind us.

Getting on board the X5 is like crossing a Stargate. Close the door and every sound disappear light years away, accentuating that detachment facilitated by a seating position several centimeters from the ground and that can be adjusted electronically, also depending on your driving mode (Sport, Comfort, Eco Pro and Adaptive, the latter able to adapt in real time to your driving style). There is plenty of space, both front and back, and some details like the crystal shift knob are perhaps superfluous, biased and expensive, but they are also those bits that make this one of the most ergonomic and best finished cockpits in the segment. The black plastics don’t give any kind of economic feeling and where climate controls are still (fortunately) physical, on the central tunnel you have the big wheel through which to manage the extraordinary multimedia display, while in front of the sports steering wheel we have the BMW Live Cockpit Professional, fully digital and capable of displaying any information the driver wants. You turn back and it seems to be sitting at the wheel of a studio apartment, the exact opposite of the Mazda, a two-seater that finally offers the possibility of adjusting the steering wheel both in height and in depth. Space on board is not claustrophobic, not even with the canvas roof closed over your head, but I challenge you not to want to capture the deepest essence of an en plein air drive of a car that transmits its mechanical feedback along the whole body of the one holding the wheel. 6-speed manual gearbox near the right hand, short couplings and gear lever, precise steering – maybe of a little generous diameter, – a small display in the middle of the dashboard and an almost completely analog three-piece instrumentation. The only real option is traction control, which despite the shy cavalry compared to the 160 and 184 horsepower of the 2-liter engine, allows you to have fun widening the rear and enjoying an almost total control of the car.

Quick lunch break, taking advantage of BMW’s tailgate that splits in two parts, leaving the possibility of using the lower flap as a support and we’re back on the road again, continuing to switch cars and keep constant the comparison of two models no longer as opposed as they seemed the previous evening, before this bizarre expedition began. Neither is thirsty, the X5 because it has a pretty big tank (80 liters) and an efficient Common Rail turbodiesel capable of limiting consumption at 6.1 l/100km in the mixed cycle, the Mazda (6l /100km average in the mixed cycle) because of its featherweight that requires very little effort to move, as long as you do not constantly move kissing the rev limiter, which in a day like this is justifiable for fun. The meeting point happens to be the precision factor in tackling any type of road and regardless of how it can be faced. Going down from one to go on board the other is like pressing a giant button that turns a more focused driving on the exaltation of emotions (the Mazda) to a guide built around a substantially perfect engineering success (BMW). It is here that you realize that one does not exclude the other and that you have probably found the ultimate pair of metals for your ideal garage.

Where the small and cute Mazda requires something like € 27,000 (the unit of our test reaches € 30,000 for the special color and the nappa leather interior), the quality and the thousand goodies of the X5 impose a more demanding economic effort, with the Msport specification that brings the starting price at around € 81,000, making it not only beautiful to look at, but distinctly sporty, still taking just 6 and a half seconds to shoot from 0 to 100 kph. Numbers that in the end are the mirror of substantially different needs, that find their last word in what you’re really looking for in a car. And I won’t even tell you which car I decided to go home with, on a return journey in which I tried to answer myself several times about which of the two I preferred. For once, it is their abysmal diversity that makes them both indispensable. On a day like today, we were all convinced to praise the SUV for its comfort and the roadster for the driving experience, instead we come back to the HQ with the knowledge that the X5 is not afraid to tackle bends like its chili pepper sister X5M, while the MX-5 has proved to be exciting, visceral, literally alive even when traveling at 40 kph, with the arm hanging out of the window and the wind caressing your face. Whatever the final choice may be, you’ll end up behind the wheel of a giant of the automotive world, always ready to satisfy our desire and our need to hold a steering wheel in our hands and this seems to me more than enough. By the way, when do we leave again?