Recently, I drove my 8 a little over a thousand miles, to and from the big classic car weekend (includes the Pebble Beach Concours d'Elegance) in Monterey. A huge feature of this trip for me is the 120 miles of California Highway 1 from San Simeon to Monterey (and back) - a stretch of road I call "the greatest two hours in an American sportscar driver's life".

This road has it all: very twisty but with the occasional straight stretch so you can overtake slower traffic if you're quick about it; just enough elevation change; great beauty, running as it does along the Pacific through forests, meadows and the occasional fog bank; and except for about four small sections, a really superbly maintained surface.

Get this piece of road right, and you'll know a lot about your car's and your own capabilities. Get it wrong, and it's a long, long drop to the rocks and the surf. I've been lucky enough to drive all or part of it in a lot of different cars, including my '86 and '94 RX7s and a pre-release Infiniti G35, and honestly had modest expectations for my 8. But here's what I know now.

The Mazda engineers have given us a whole lot of car. Sure, there are lots of faster cars in The Stoplight Grand Prix. But use the gearbox to keep the revs up where the engine's making its power, and it gets down the road (and around the slower traffic) just fine.

That nice, comfy ride around town conceals a very competent set of handling characteristics that are very sure-footed and predictable.

The brakes are excellent and the DSC does a really nice job of pulling the car back within limits without you having to do it - probably with a lot more drama.

The seats, which I didn't think too much of, are more than adequate to keep your behind where it belongs during spirited cornering.

And it does all this without making you feel as though you've gone for a ride in a Waring blender. A very satisfying, and slightly surprising experience.

 

...driver's highway in America. What kind of police presence does it have? One of my dream vacations is to head up there to play Pebble Beach, Spyglass and the Links at Spanish Bay. Part of the trip would be to take a weekend just to drive up and down that coast! :D

Arvin

 

The police presence is quite sparse. Fine unless you need help, because cellular coverage is nil.

 

(The following refers to the stretch between San Francisco and Santa Barbara.
I've driven that trip a few dozen times.)

The nice thing about police on Highway 1 is that in some little towns the cops still use X-band radar or permanent-on-Lazar. So a radar detector can really help you.

Same was true at least in 2001 on I-5 (the boring interstate parallel to Hi-1).

In the richer areas of California e.g. Silicon Valley, since ~ 2002 cops everywhere have those radar guns that are totally passive and undetectable until they fire them at you. A radar detector is pointless in this situation.

But in places like Paso Robles (South of Monterrey) they still have the radar-detector-friendly technology :D

 

I've experienced this trip . . . from the passenger's seat of a rental Mercury, with my friend's mom at the tiller.

Frustrating.

Pretty, but frustrating.

Peace
policy

 

Another favorite - though much shorter - is the stretch of 58 from PG to Laguna Seca. Especially the first couple of miles.