I was driving over to the girlfriends place over the weekend and I remember looking in my rearview mirror and seeing a white mazda 3. Then when I glanced up again I noticed that the lower black part of the grill was a little bigger than a normal 3's. And I was thinking "oh sweet a speed 3, let see if he knows how to drive it". So a few lights down I was still in front of him and in the far right lane and the light in front of us changed to yellow. And as it changed, he cut over and got into the far left lane so there was a lane in front of us. I knew he noticed me and was going to use that far left turning lane to pass the cars in the middle lane.

So the light turned green and I slipped the clutch and chirped the tires a bit and didn't let up the whole time. I had my window down and as the light went green I heard him bark his tires as he tired so hard to hook up. I was a good 2 cars in front of him as I was comming to the top of first and the whole way up I could see him in my mirrors and hear that turbo spooling up. I heard his tires bark again as he went into sencond and I thought for sure he was going to pass me but by the time I was shifting out of 2nd I had to shut it down and turn in front of him in his lane. I got to my turn off at a red light and he pulled up beside me and I gave him the thumbs up and he gave it back with a grin on his face.

I had less than a 1/4 tank and I'm sure if we went from a roll I'd be loosing ground instead of trying to hold onto it. The jump off the line is what gave me my advantage and lucky for me we didn't get a chance to see what his third gear might have done to me.

 

Too bad they don't put the MZR motor in the Rx8, then it'd be worth buying

Will mazda ever make a mazdaspeed 8?

 

The Mazdaspeed 3 has traction issues in first and second gear even with the ECU assist. If he went to third he would have walked you hard. Full boost doesn't hit till third gear because of the ECU limiter. The Rx-8 doesn't stand a chance against the Mazdaspeed 3 in stoplight races.

 

RX-8 0-60 is about 5.8 if I'm not mistaken (please correct me if I'm wrong).
MS3 0-60 is about 5.5 if I remember correctly.

Stock for Stock 1/4 I 'think' is 14.5 to 13.9 ....

Good race; IMO it's a Drivers race from a stop. RX-8= better launch. Both nice fairly quick/fast cars.