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We broke this story back on October 13th...

Dear 001,

I think I may have uncovered the hottest scoop of the year.

Last week at a super-secret focus group location in Hollywood, I got a glimpse of one of the hottest little sport coupes I’ve seen in a long time.

It was only shown in concept form but boy was this thing hot!

Imagine a cross between the RX-8 and the Aston Martin DB9 but in a much smaller package.

From the side and rear view it is pure Aston and from the front it’s a more radical RX-8.

It has big bulging front wheel surrounds.

Even more pronounced than the RX-8.

In the same room with the new little coupe, were the potential competitors surrounding it.

The Acura TSX, Scion TC, Honda Civic, Mazda RX-8, Mazda Miata, Mitsubishi Eclipse and the G35 coupe rounded out the list.

They were looking for customer feedback about the pros and cons of each cars interiors and exteriors.

Needless to say, the new Coupe made EVERY car look obsolete except the G35 coupe.

The G is not as cool looking but it is more refined, elegant and looks more expensive.

But this new coupe, which we will coin the code name of DB1 from this point forward, really made the biggest statement.

Even though it is still in concept form (not even a working mockup) I was able to get the exact specs:

4 cyl. 2.0 liter engine
161 HP
129 Torque
2436 lbs.
18” tires

Aside from the radically cool design a few totally new features were being tested to see if there was interest from consumers.

One was the fact that it is the first car I know of where the front and rear passenger seats were WIDER than the driver and rear drivers side passenger seat.

The reason for this was two-fold.

The front seat back folded forward turning the front seat into a mini table or foot ottoman for the rear seat passenger.

Plus the rear passenger seat reclined.

Finally, the front windshield went back halfway across the whole roof (like a combo pano windshield roof) and there was a pop up spoiler above the rear window.

But the best part was the base price they were projecting of between $18-$20K!

Any negatives?

The only one I could see is that anyone over 6’2” won’t find much room in this compact coupe.

It was WAY smaller inside than the Civic’s, Scion, TSX, etc.

But it was one GORGEOUS design!!!!

I’ll pass along more details as I get them from my mole within Mazda.

Gary D.

When we published it, we got the usual naysayers saying we were wrong...

Check this blog entry:

Ekkie - 10/13/2005 10:16:38 PM
Title: This story sounds very suss!!
Comment: This story doesn't sound right (ie; details sound like they may have been falsified).

1. 'Gary D.' doesn't tell us who makes the car to begin with (he just tells us it's a cross between the RX-8 and the DB9).

2. If this was shown as a concept, then how do they know the exact power/torque/weight figures, when everybody knows that these figures differ from production models (plus they are very basic specs,if they were EXACT specs, then they would me more advanced/detailed then those provided.

3. From info given by people very close to me(re. a similar program that Audi undertook recently on a potential new model - that's all I'm saying on that!! :)), these focus-groups do NOT give out exact specs (and these are NOT EXACT SPECS ANYWAY!!), they only ask for views/perspectives on the design on the car and how it compares to similar models on the market.

4. This model does not make much sense. The US specs for your Mazda MX5 show that it weighs just another 64 pounds, has 9 more horsepower and just another 11 lb-ft of torque - plus it's a soft-top. And for $2-3K cheaper for a coupe, all a car like this would do is canabalise MX5 sales, soe WHY would Mazda release a car like this in the first place??

Hey Ekkie!

NEVER DOUBT THE SPIES!!!!

Here is the car we scooped the world on, the Mazda Kabura concept...





















When I spoke to one of the designers of the car she said to me that there were no design themes taken from the Aston DB-series.

Yea, right!

The AutoSpies.com BS decoder was registering a reading of 10 out of 10.

Just in case you're not familiar with the AutoSpies.com BS decoder, here's the scale it works off of...1 is No BS detected, 10 is get out of the way or you'll be covered with crap! ;)

More photos of this are in our Detroit auto show gallery on page 41 and others...

Click here to view the 2006 Detroit auto show photo gallery

Special thanks from the Spies and our readers to the Lexus for making the 2006 Detroit auto show photo gallery possible!