Question for you more experienced car owners.

silverpence

I've been driving my 350Z all year round for 4 years now and will do the same with the 370Z. We do get quite a lot of snow here "North of the border" but the roads where I live are usually well plowed reasonably quickly so most of the time driving the Z during winter is not a problem.

Of course the Z is not the best option for winter driving, and front-wheel drive cars like your Mazda or all-wheel drive cars like SUVs and such will obviously handle winter better. But like you I liked the Z and I'm not a winter beater kind of guy either, and I did not let the winter driving issue get in the way of getting the Z as my daily driver 4 years back (I already did have some rear-wheel drive winter driving experience from my teen years though). What do you think people did in snowy regions before front-wheel drive and all-wheel drive cars became quite common? They drove rear-wheel drive cars and did not have all the traction control aids that modern rear-wheel drive cars like the Z get these days. Again front/all-wheel drive cars are better suited for winter driving but rear-wheel drive cars like the Z can be driven during snowy winters too.

With a good set of 4 winter tires (a must), some common sense (e.g. the Z is not an SUV and steep icy hills are not your friend) and some practice on driving a rear-wheel drive car on snowy roads, driving the Z during winter is definitely doable and can be quite enjoyable too (e.g. purposely losing the end of the car a little around empty street corners and letting the traction control system do it's thing can be fun!). The 350Z VDC system is actually very good at keeping you on the road if you happen to give the Z too much power on a slippery road, but you have to remember to turn it off when trying to get going from an unplowed area with a significant amount of snow like a parking lot.

Just my .02 cents