Mazda's new flagship – a seven-seat SUV – arrives to challenge the likes of the Skoda Kodiaq
In the world of eccentric Japanese car manufacturers, the maker of this car, the new Mazda CX-80, is perhaps the most unpredictable and wilful.Take the Pathfinder XV-1: a Series 1 Land Rover knock-off, only even more goggle-eyed, especially when painted Kermit green, as many were. In the 1960s, a tiny run of these 4x4s left a dedicated Mazda plant in what was then Burma, having been ordered by various government agencies. The funny thing is that even today some Mazda execs won’t believe the XV-1 really existed unless you show them a physical specimen. With its badges. If the XV-1 was at least functional, the Parkway 26 was the oddball motor show concept that made production. With a glasshouse to rival that of The Shard, the pretty-ish 26 was a three-tonne, 25-seat minibus hauled along by, of all things, a gutless two-rotor Wankel. To make anything like progress, the thing had to be so remorselessly caned that two 70-litre fuel tanks were needed to assuage its thirst. A good-old reciprocating engine of 1000cc was also called for if you wanted to power the air-con. Talk about a vicious cycle. Just 44 were made.    All of which is to say that, for Mazda, developing a big-capacity oil-burner from scratch, then launching it into Europe amid the continent’s prevailing, puritanical anti-diesel sentiment, is a perfectly normal thing to do.Its clever new mild-hybrid 3.3-litre straight six made its debut a year or two ago in the Mazda CX-60. That car was a mid-sized SUV with an interesting interior, quietly engaging handling and conspicuously poor ride quality, in thanks part to an over-damped back axle.We rather liked the longitudinal motor, though. Depending on driveline, it came with either 197bhp and 332lb ft (RWD) or 251bhp and 406lb ft (4WD) – both modest outputs given the displacement, in return for easy drivability and efficiency. It duly delivered both.That car now has a bigger sibling in the form of the CX-80 tested here. It's a seven-seater designed to take on the likes of the Skoda Kodiaq and Hyundai Santa Fe, and has come in for some chassis tweaks, to make it more refined on the move. Has it worked? Time to find out.
