Detroit 2007: your guide to the show - Mazda

Mazda's door fetish
Mazda loves its concept cars and it seems obsessed with unusual doors.

This Ryuga concept at the Detroit show, for instance, has a nice big pair of gullwing doors that open down the full length of the body, just like the Nagare it showed last year in LA.

The small Kabura concept sports car it showed at Detroit last year had three doors, an additional rear door on the passenger side that slides back to provide access to the rear. The RX-8, of course has rearward-opening back doors, too.

While we may see the Kabura pretty soon - in about a year or so, perhaps - the Nagare and this latest Ryuga are designed to show what Mazda's might look like in about 10 years' time.

Don't write off the look of these cars, either. Mazda has produced concept after concept in the same mould, so it's definitely a big fan of the wedge look.

Japanese for dummies
Nagare (the LA car) means 'flow', while Ryuga (the one at Detroit) means 'gracious flow'. Now you can work that into your next conversation in Japanese.