Mazda MazdaSpeed 3 - Transmission

Power is routed to the front wheels by a new six-speed manual gearbox. There’s no automatic available, a “posers need not apply” move that may earn Mazda some street cred among the hard-core “tuner” crowd. If you’re thinking that putting that kind of horsepower in a front-wheel-drive car sounds like a recipe for torque steer under hard acceleration, you’re right. Mazda engineers have gone to great lengths to minimize this, however, with a sophisticated collection of hardware and software including equal-length half-shafts, a limited-slip differential and a computer that both modulates throttle inputs and bleeds off turbo boost in first and second gear.