Macan is now on its winter wheels. Once I'd got the stack of wheels out of the garage it was fairly quick - probably 25 mins getting eveyrthing out and in the right places and 10 mins to actually change them. Prompted by a puncture again though, annoying.
More fun was learning a bit more about the MX5 on Saturday. I avoided a TL:DR after I got back. I have compared it to my old Elise but now I've run it in and can use all the revs it's much more obviously front-engined: the Elise rear end was very well tied down and you could lean on it while the MX5 has less weight on the rear and more power so is playful. A couple of times I put my foot down harder mid-corner to see how it would react and I think the electronics braked the inner wheel to make the car rotate. A few more times I simply got it to unstick (generally only in 2nd gear though). I did find 3rd to be an excellent gear because it runs to just over 90mph at 7,500rpm. While there's no VTEC kick it does go harder in the last maybe 3000-3500rpm (so from 50-55mph). It's a good overtaking gear.
I also wanted to find out which roads suited it best. Definitely B-roads; A-roads are fine but in Wales on Saturday morning the A-roads had traffic on and the B-roads basically didn't. First thing, the wider sweeping A-road felt less sure-footed than similar speeds on tighter B-roads later, maybe that was just me getting used to the car or possibly the tyres warming up. I had an absolutely fantastic drive back down the B4355 from Dolfor to Knighton; one we've used on meets before (where we started at Morville, went down the B4368 to Kerry and then back on the B4355). The car just felt amazing on that, suiting it perfectly and giving me more and more confidence to play with how it behaves.
My other major take-away was that there's more traffic everywhere, particularly on the A-roads, more speed limits and it would be much more difficult now to put together a good route. Arranging a meet would be harder than it used to be. And pretty though the Elan Valley is, it's attracting tourists now and the roads are pretty rubbish for driving; they're too tight with other vehicles and there are quite a few broken surfaces and potholes. Worth it for photos only. The mountain road to Cwmystwyth is still fun. And in the old lead mine there was where I made an attempt to recreate a photo of my last MX5. The piles of spoil have changed a bit though so I couldn't work out the exact location. Wonder who has been shifting it around?
