Mazda's MX-5 has been around so long it's old enough to buy you a pint. Since its inception in the late eighties endless numbers of experts and enthusiasts alike have extolled its virtues as a great little fun car. I'm going to disappoint you by adding my name to this list. I'm ashamed to say that I'd never driven an MX-5 until this car spent a week with us and with the new car due for launch very soon you have to say it's not a moment too soon.

The MX-5's looks are familiar now and are, subjectively at least, one of the car's weakest traits. The car looks well, a little girly. Fair enough it does look like a sports car as it's a convertible, but it doesn't have any real road presence and is just a little too cutesy for my liking. The new car is a real step forward as far as this issue is concerned.

Our test car was a special edition Icon, one of last cars that will be made of this generation MX-5 so is liable to be a bit of a sought after classic in a few years time. Based on the 1.8-litre model with a 5-speed box this £17,100 Icon comes with the normal MX-5 bits and bobs and adds black leather heated seats along with leather trim on the wheel, gear shift and handbrake. It is also fitted with a heated glass rear window, a wind blocker and additional speakers for the stereo, and comes in a range of four exclusive exterior colours with some nice 15-inch five-spoke alloys.

All very nice, but if I'm completely honest I'm not that interested. If this were the new car such equipment details and interior trim would be subject to much closer scrutiny but this isn't the case with an outgoing model. The objective of our time with the car is to get a feel for the driving experience before we're whisked off to the launch of the new model in November.

Getting into the MX-5 you immediately feel part of it. You sit hunkered low down in the snug cabin with a good view over the long bonnet. Personally I found I'd liked to have been able to drop the seat a little bit lower as I was hunching to try and keep the cant rail out of my line of sight at all times. Ultimately interior space, including stowage and boot space is a little limited. I'm sure the new car will address these things.

Getting under way the car feels nice and tight with fairly light steering at town speeds. The gearshift is a little notchy on first acquaintance but not annoyingly or, perhaps more importantly, obstructively. As the roads wind out onto the sweeping country roads we use as our favoured test routes, I pull over to drop the hood and find the experience a revelation. Reach up and undo the two retaining clips and you simply pull the roof back over your head. Job done. Three seconds. All this fuss about roofs dropping in 30 seconds powered by umpteen motors all seems a little foolish in comparison.

On the move there is a tad more buffeting than you'd expect in a newer car but this isn't in any way harsh, just not as refined as is expected now. It certainly doesn't mar the experience. In stark terms the straight-line speed of the MX-5 is now also a little lacking. The venerable 146bhp 1.8-litre four-pot does a fair job but is a bit breathless and lacks the guts you now take for granted in a car of this ilk.

So the car is old and wheezy and well past its sell by date? Hell, no. As the road begins to tighten the MX-5 comes alive. Regular twists and turns negate the lack of ultimate horsepower and allow you to really understand what the MX-5 is about; balance. It's perfect. That front engine rear drive layout pays in spades with delightful uncorrupted steering that communicates like few others - the low speed lightness giving way to perfect loading up in corners to give wonderful weight and feel. Where else it pays is in the optimum weight distribution adding to the delicate balance you can feel as a consequence.

Throw the car into a one off corner and there isn't a jaw-dropping amount of grip. What there is, however, is an absolute feel for how much grip you have and how much more is in the bag. Playing with the throttle allows you to adjust this ratio and alter cornering angles and attitude to your heart's content. Where the fun really starts is in series of bends, where the agility and fluency is fantastic. My route took me over the Yorkshire dales and through some Lake District roads and the car simply excelled in this environment leaving much more powerful machinery in its wake.

The brakes easily contain the 146bhp on tap, as does the chassis and you can extract the best from every one of these horses at leisure. The MX-5's small size and agility mean you can make use of this chassis in relative safety almost anywhere. On any given road the chassis' perfect compromise between grip and fun combines with the delicious control interfaces, throttle response and bolt action gear-change to intoxicate like few others. The MX-5 wants you to enjoy yourself. "Spank me!" it says. And so I did, for hours and hours, interspersed with rather annoyingly frequent trips to the petrol station. The car isn't that thirsty, but the tank isn't very big - hopefully the new MX-5 addresses this as well.

The old MX-5 may now show its age in terms of the straight-line performance and packaging, but where it counts for us, as enthusiasts, the car still delivers by the bucket load. The excellence is baked into the chassis and has not been diluted with age; the whole dynamic package is still fabulous. Over the years other rivals may have overtaken it in terms of looks, power and interior standards but none has reached the heights that the MX-5 still scales.

The car has obvious weak points that the new car needs to address. I just hope that Mazda doesn't go crazy and lose the core excellence of the current car in the bid to up its game. This car is exactly what it says on the badge: an Icon.