The Pontiac Solstice has overtaken Mazda’s MX-5 Miata in the 2006 sales race to become America’s most popular roadster. The Solstice ended the year with 19,710 sales in the US, while the MX-5 notched up 16,897 sales, which was still up a massive 72.4% on last year’s result. Mazda’s North American Operations’ top executive Jim O’Sullivan was unfazed by the news citing the large upswing in sales and the differing customer base between the two brands as a positive indicator of future growth.

Additionally, O’Sullivan stated in an interview with WardsAuto “we could have sold a bunch more MX-5 Miatas if we wanted to, but capacity was an issue. And Mazda’s US division had no interest in offering incentives for volume sales of the new roadster.” Also, the more popular retractable hardtop version didn’t enter the market until October, with many areas not receiving the model until November.

O’Sullivan finished the interview with the statement “the MX-5 is still the number one selling roadster in the world and one year is definitely too brief a period to define success or failure.”