1,000 Miatas in One Place: Inside the UK’s Biggest MX-5 Owners Club Rally
MX-5 Rally Gaydon, UK
Sunday morning started with an hour’s drive from home to the British Motor Museum for the annual MX-5 Owners Club Rally. I’d joined the club a few weeks earlier and my welcome pack had arrived with my ticket for the event, so the Miata was pointed towards Gaydon and off I went. As I got closer to the museum, I started picking up other MX-5s along the way. One became two, then three, and by the time we reached the entrance there were about five of us travelling in an unofficial little convoy.
That was only a taste of what was waiting inside.
I have genuinely never seen so many Mazda MX-5s in one place. There seemed to be cars everywhere. NA, NB, NC and ND generations, completely standard cars, beautifully restored examples and heavily modified track cars. There must have been around 1,000 MX-5s across the site.
Unfortunately, there was also a lot of rain.
I’d arrived without a raincoat or umbrella, so when it really started coming down I took refuge under the BC Racing awning. Conveniently, they had a racing simulator set up with Silverstone National Circuit and a top-ten leaderboard. Silverstone National is a circuit I’ve actually won at in real life, so naturally I had to have a go. It had been a while since I’d driven either a simulator or a race car, and my lap was fairly ropey, but I managed a 54.5 — 2ths off top spot. Respectable enough, although it was a scrappy lap and it should have really been top spot and a 53s lap - of course!
Eventually the rain stopped and I headed back out amongst the cars.
One of the best things about the MX-5 community is the variety. You can have two cars that left the Mazda factory virtually identical and, years later, their owners have taken them in completely different directions. I met two brothers running a performance company who had done exactly that. One of their cars had been transformed into a 500 bhp, supercharged, non-road-legal track weapon. It sounded absolutely incredible and looked like enormous fun. Beside it was almost the complete opposite. A white Mk3 MX-5 that, at first glance, looked relatively standard. Under the bonnet, however, was a 2.4-litre Honda engine conversion producing around 300 bhp. Upgraded brakes and suspension helped deal with the extra performance, but visually it remained wonderfully understated. A genuine sleeper.
I also met Pete and Charlie, two more owners who were happy to stand around talking MX-5s. Pete had number 564 of the limited-edition Sport Recaro models, while Charlie had a lovely blue Mk4 with a straight-through exhaust. We chatted about ownership, suspension, B14 coilovers and the inevitable question every Miata owner eventually seems to ask: what should I modify next?
Between all of this, there was the British Motor Museum itself.
I’ve visited several times before and regularly bring American guests here as part of UK driving tours. If you’re a car enthusiast visiting Britain, it’s well worth adding to your itinerary. Walk through the entrance and you immediately understand why. British motoring history surrounds you, from early Land Rovers and classic Minis to Aston Martins and some of the most important cars produced in Britain.
But today belonged to the Mazda MX-5.
By the afternoon the sun had finally appeared, although with dark clouds still surrounding us I wasn't entirely convinced it would last. I headed back towards the enormous sea of MX-5s to find my car and grab my sunglasses. Finding one particular MX-5 amongst hundreds of them turned out to be harder than expected.
For an American Miata owner visiting the UK, events like this show just how strong the MX-5 community is on this side of the Atlantic. Different name, right-hand-drive cars and British weather, but exactly the same enthusiasm for Mazda's little roadster. And after seeing what other owners have done to theirs, I've now got far too many ideas for mine.
