Special guests

We have a few well-known folks who will be joining us at the event. Here's who you can expect. Bios will be coming shortly.

Derek Jenkins

In his new role as Design Director, Jenkins oversees a staff of about 25, which pushes creative boundaries by developing advanced ideas for Mazda's next generation of cars. The Irvine-based team is credited with the Kabura, Nagare and Furai concept cars, as well as the new 2009 MAZDA6 and 2010 MAZDA3.

In other words, he's going to design the next Miata!

Tom Matano

Tom was the Design Director for the first two generations of Miata. While he is no longer with Mazda, he's still a vital part of the Miata community and loves to see the cars used as intended. Today, he is the Executive Director of Industrial Design at the Academy of Art University in San Francisco. His enthusiasm for the Miata is being passed along to his students, as a couple of them have volunteered their design services for our event - that's where our logo came from.

Read his welcome letter to everyone coming to Miatas at Mazda Raceway. He was our Grand Marshall in 2009.

Aaron Robinson

Since 2000 Aaron has been technical editor of Car and Driver magazine, based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. He got the job by knowing how to pronounce boss man Csaba Csere's name correctly. Yes, he's the one who crashed a new Ferrari on the press launch in Italy, but as with all such incidents, it was the photographer's fault. Since moving to Calfornia to staff the company's west coast office, he has quit wearing pants. The attached photo is of Robinson testing his favorite vehicle so far: an M1A1 Abrams tank nicknamed "Death Before Dismount."

Dan Edmunds

Dan is a mechanical engineer and auto writer who runs the vehicle testing department at Edmunds.com (no relation, he swears!). Before that he worked as a test driver and suspension development engineer for two major automakers, Toyota and Hyundai.

“Thing is, my SCCA showroom stock racing experience actually got me in to the vehicle development and evaluation game on a professional level”, says Dan. “It actually made a difference on my resume. Too bad I didn’t learn any really sneaky car setup tricks until after I took a break from road racing and parked the Miata.”

But he’s still got that same white 1990 Miata, a car that first got an SCCA logbook in September 1989 and earned the Mazda Miata its first-ever race win in February 1991. It went dormant in the mid 90’s but came out of hiding in 1999 to win a rallycross championship and complete a gravel stage rally using a suspension setup Dan developed. Through it all the car still has less than 7,000 miles on the clock. Now back in original showroom stock trim, Dan is bringing the car back to Mazda Raceway.
Read more about the car

Keith Tanner

Keith spends his days pushing the limits of Miatas as one of the techs at Flyin' Miata. He's written two popular books on the car - and for fans of those, there's a third technical volume coming out in January 2011.

He has also been very active in the online community for over 15 years, answering questions and helping solve a huge range of problems. Evenings are taken up with a range of projects from lightweight sports cars to an MGB GT with an LS1 inside, always using Miata parts of some sort.

He and his wife ran the Targa Newfoundland in a rally-prepped Miata in 2008, and are hoping to return in 2010. That car will be at Mazda Raceway this spring, giving rides.