Auto News 5

After being smitten with the clean looks of our Four Seasons 2013 Mazda CX-5, we are finding out that the beauty is more than skin deep. The CX-5 is the second car in Mazda's U.S. lineup to gain the automaker's new Skyactiv suite of powertrain engineering, after the 2012 Mazda3. Rather than opting for forced induction and higher final-drive ratios to find efficiency gains without losing performance, Skyactiv works to optimize a known quantity -the internal combustion engine. To up the engine's efficiency by a claimed 15 percent, Mazda increased the little four-banger's compression ratio to an incredibly high 13:1, added direct injection and electronically variable valve timing, lengthened piston stroke by 8.1 millimeters, and reduced internal friction.