BY DANIEL DEGASPERI | 29th Aug 2018
OPEN the automotive equivalent of a Babushka doll family, and something like the Mazda SUV breed would emerge. This makes no reference to styling sameness, but these days this CX-9 Touring could swallow the CX-3, CX-5 and CX-8 inside with space to spare.
Growing pains have therefore afflicted this seven-seat petrol-only CX-9, only two years old but already revised last year with reduced noise, vibration and harshness (NVH) measures, a new torque vectoring system for the chassis, plus more equipment all for a higher price. The changes are all there in order to, in particular, make room for the also-seven-seat, diesel-only CX-8.
Perhaps a smaller family looking for ultimate economy wants the latter, which is narrower and more affordable, but should a larger brood still cop the larger dimensions and higher fuel consumption of this larger Mazda SUV, tested here as a CX-9 Touring all-wheel drive middle model grade?
A new addition to the family certainly makes for renewed context and, possibly, a revised answer.