On looks alone, the Mazda6 has to be one of the most appealing cars in its class. The saloon is very handsome, the Tourer estate better still, and if I were going to buy a 6 for myself I would certainly splash out an extra £660 on the optional Soul Red metallic paint.
If you're more interested in an estate car than a saloon your priorities no doubt include load space, and the Tourer has an acceptable 522 litres of boot capacity. Folding down the rear seats more than trebles the load capacity to over 1,600 litres, and putting stuff inside is very easy because the tailgate opening is wide and the load sill is at floor level.
The interior is spacious, comfortable and well-equipped, with DAB digital radio, the complicated looking but easy to use MZD Connect multimedia system and brilliantly supportive seats. In Sport Nav form, the 6 also has Smart City Brake Support, leather upholstery, a head-up display and satellite navigation whose graphics are among the finest in the industry.
I covered a lot of ground on motorways when driving this car, and found the Tourer to be more pleasant than when on country roads, where the car didn't show up well at all.
When the road surface became rough and unpleasant, the front and rear ends started bouncing at different rates. Petrol engine Tourers on the same roads did not have this problem, so it probably has something to do with engine weight.
On motorways and A-roads the car behaves better, though there is a conflict between the soft, comfort-oriented suspension settings and the abrupt way the 45-section tyres on the Sport Nav's standard 19-inch wheels deal with small bumps. Yes, the wheels look very good, but I'd trade some of the car's visual appeal for better ride quality every day of the week and twice on Sundays.
Since I was using the Tourer for relaxed long-distance transport I didn't find that the 173bhp diesel engine (also available with 148bhp at lower cost) overpowered the front axle. But again previous experience tells me that this can be a problem if, for example, you're hoofing it out of a roundabout. Wind noise on motorways also conceals the fact that the engine is quite grumbly at lower speeds.
With its smooth-shifting six-speed automatic gearbox, this Tourer model officially averages 57.6mpg, and the trip computer told me that I'd managed 44mpg. It seemed to be a little pessimistic. According to my own measurements I slightly exceeded 45mpg - not too bad since the car was almost always carrying something, but I was hoping to get closer to 50mpg.
That aside, I was happy with my week in the car - certainly a lot more than I would have been if I'd spent more time on more challenging roads. For £28,795 (before options) you get a decent amount of room and loads of equipment, and in my view a more satisfying design than any rival manufacturer can provide.
Still, it's a car that works far better on motorways than on any other type of road, and despite the obvious fuel economy I'd rather have a petrol version with its broader driving appeal, at least until Mazda sorts out the diesel's suspension.
