Mazda’s Fan Festa PH 2024 is proof of the brand’s strong following

Close friends will know how much of a fan I am of the Mazda brand. Sounding biased be damned, I think the brand offers so much more compared to its rivals. 

In fact, I wanted to purchase a Mazda 3 2.0 HEV Fastback last year, only to be dissuaded by my mother who wanted a used luxury sedan instead.

Almost a month after the Mazda Fan Festa 2024 was held in Japan, Mazda Philippines has brought the celebration of all things Mazda to the country with the Mazda Fan Festa PH 2024, recently held at the Clark International Speedway last November 16 (Saturday) and it proves how strong the brand’s following is here in our market.

The Mazda Fan Festa PH 2024 is its second run in the country, after its first run was held last year as the Mazda Fan Fest PH. I was not able to attend due to prior commitments with another brand, but there we were up early for what I did not expect to become a personal highlight of this year.

I hitched a ride with my bestfriend who drives a 2024 Mazda 3 2.0 Sport Fastback in a beautiful shade of Deep Crystal Blue, one of my favorite car colors of all time. After about an hour and a half on the road, we were approaching the Clark International Speedway, surrounded by several Mazda MX-5s. 

The day’s activities started with the opening ceremony where Angie Mead King welcomed everyone with a quick rev from her heavily-modified and rotary-powered Mazda RX-7. This was followed by a quick lap around the track.

After the opening ceremony, Mazda owners who registered for the track experience sessions were called to take their vehicles on the track and freely push them to the limit. Of course, my bestfriend could not say no to this. While he drove, I experienced his car as a passenger. 

While I’ve driven this specific car extensively inside the city, on the highway and track I’ve not. Also given that the car is less than a year old and only has a little over 4,000 km on the odometer, it was also his first time. Watching him toss it around the corners and flooring the accelerator was enough for me to know how well it performed.

This was followed by the MSCC Spec Series–a one-make race with the Mazda MX-5 for Manila Sports Car Club (MSCC) members, and the Miata Cup for members of the Miata Club of the Philippines.

While it was great seeing all the two-door roadsters pushing around the track, I couldn’t help but think of how much I’d love to experience driving one of them, and exactly that I got a few hours later which I could say was the highlight of my Fan Festa PH experience.

With a second track experience session later in the day, I wanted to participate. I doubt my friend will ever let me track his car, so I asked the Mazda Philippines peeps if they could provide any car for me to track. They obliged and lent me a rare Mazda MX-5 RF 30th Anniversary Edition. 

This special MX-5 was introduced locally in 2019 and is exclusively available in the RF (Retractable Fastback) body style, and painted in Racing Orange. It also gets a set of 17-inch Rays forged alloy wheels and orange brake calipers.

Powering this is a 2.0-liter naturally-aspirated Skyactiv-G engine that makes 184 horsepower and 205 Nm of torque. This particular unit was equipped with a 6-speed automatic transmission which saddened me a bit, but hey it’s still a Miata after all. Let’s save the manual for a different time.

First impressions? It’s small AF. I’m by no means tall standing at just 5’7” in height. I had to put the hard top down just to get my full face helmet on. My bestfriend on the passenger seat did not fare any better at his height of 5’10”. We just decided to keep the top down later on despite the hot sun.

After a bit of a wait, we entered the track and after a lap of me getting a feel of the car, it was time to push it a bit harder. 

We drove the automatic, we had a couple of inexperienced drivers surrounding us, and we had to take extra care of the car we were driving as it wasn’t ours. Despite that, the MX-5 was surely pure driving bliss. It’s not fast, and reminded me a lot of the Mazda 3, yet it corners like a dream. I’m pretty sure I’ve never taken the twists and turns of the Clark Speedway at those speeds on our usual media track days with other higher-performance vehicles.

About 12 laps and 30 minutes of fun acceleration, braking, and tight corners, it was time to exit to the pits and park the car back where I got it. Sad, but surely fulfilled. Driving a Miata ticked-off the bucket list.

Now, time to ask if I could borrow the manual soft-top demo car.

A few minutes later, we got back onto the track with the Mazda 3 for the day’s capping-off activity. The final activity was the Sunset Parade where everyone drove their Mazda vehicles on a lap around the Clark International Speedway as the sun began to set behind the nearby mountain ranges. Being part of this simply felt surreal. The photos say it all.

Next goal? To attend the Mazda Fan Festa at Fuji Speedway in Japan and experience the thrilling sound of the Mazda 787B, and to attend next year’s Mazda Fan Festa PH as a Mazda owner. I already have the Mazda Spirit Racing stickers, an AutoExe bottle-opener keychain, and a rather pricey black leather keyring for my future Mazda. 😉