Fellow SOLers:
As the weather improves up here in the northern reaches, we will again be
confronted by a miasma of Miatas. I know, I know, they all drive around
with their tops up, the oil doesn't leak, they stole the design from Lotus,
they have the gall to paint them BRG, they run without having to tinker with
them, etc. (I may have missed something here -- feel free to vent on your
own). I just want to hop in here with my own observations about this
phenomenon. First, in case nobody has noticed, the Brits aren't making
sports cars any more! You know what that means? it means that we aren't
really rivals! Second, as the latest Moss Motoring mag points out so well,
all of our cars were considered inferior upstarts by other marque owners
when our cars were in production. Third, the best way to insure that the
hobby will turn gray and die is to discourage newcomers. Think of the Miata
as an "entry point" to the world of modest powered high performance driving.
After getting the "bug" many Miata owners might want to find out what the
"original" experience was like. This is the future for our hobby, not those
slack-jawed 4WD jocks, the NASCAR wannabes with their obnoxious Camaros, or
the skippers of those vans who can't seem to park them in just 1 spot. The
Miata is like a "gateway" drug -- it leads to more serious stuff.
So, I just wanted to offer this up as a "pre-emptive strike" as it's almost
time for this List's long annual string about how awful those Miatas are.
Instead of snubbing them, let's accept them as "fellow travelers" and give
a wave as we go past. Even if they don't wave back the first couple of
times, it's good training for them to be aware of the larger world of sports
cars. "Can't we all just get along?"
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