Let me preface this by stating prior to our current vehicles I have always driven smaller/compact cars.  VW Bug, VW Golf, Acura Integra, Pontiac LeMans (no, not the cool muscle car but the cheap re-branded Opel Kadet).

My wife had a fender bender and dropped our 06 Durango off for repairs.  Enterprise, granted they were trying to give us the roomiest thing in the class we were given, gave us an 09′ Mazda5.  It also just happened that today is the first real snow day in the Chicagoland area.

I get a call from my wife saying that she is stuck.  I ask where and she says in front of our house.  We have a monstrous hill/driveway but she was simply parking in front of the house on the grass.  I told her I would be right out because I handle the cars better in the winter and figured with this little front wheel drive car she probably just wasn’t use to it.  Boy was I wrong.

I’m sitting in the middle of the road and put it into its lowest gear and barely touch the pedal and got spinnage.  So much spinnage I barely kept the car on the road within the first 10 feet.  I finally had to back the car up 100 yards down the street and get a running start to make it up an itty-bitty hill/grade and then had to pop the e-brake to put it in a spin so I could turn it around and get it parked so she could leave in the right direction the next day.  I have never been in any car that has driven so poorly in the snow.

This is the first Mazda I have ever driven and I hate to say it but it will be my last one too!