Maserati GranCabrio: Beauty and the Beast

It may not be the fastest car I've ever driven, but it's certainly the most beautiful!

I was between jobs in 2012. Had moved on from Buddh International Circuit, where I had served as the PR manager and was national press officer for the inaugural Formula 1 Grand Prix of India, and had nothing much to do for a couple of months. At that time, my good friend Murali Menon, who knew exactly how much I loved fast Italian supercars, gave me an opportunity to drive the incredible Maserati GranCabrio, which was on sale in India in those days, retailing at Rs 1.76 crore ex-showroom.

Murali, who was the managing editor at MW magazine at that time, spoke to Maserati and arranged for me to drive the car on the Noida-Agra Expressway, which had just been opened up to the public and remained, for the most part, fairly empty and devoid of traffic. The Maserati was stunningly beautiful – gorgeous beyond words – and sounded divine, orgasmic, beyond anything that words can describe. Here’s the piece I wrote on the car.

Set up in 1914 in Bologna, Italy, Maserati have been making some very good-looking cars for many decades now. Take a look at the 1950s Maserati 3500GT, the 1960s Mistral, Sebring and the Ghibli, the 1970s Khamsin, Merak and the Bora and the wedge-shaped 1980s Shamal, and you’ll know why I’m saying that. And the tradition of making such cars continues with the GranCabrio, which in my books has to be the most beautiful car currently in production. It’s exquisite, the Pininfarina-designed lines, every curve painstakingly etched into metal and glass, the proportions perfect, the detailing magnificent. The car makes you wonder, all over again, what is it about Italy – a country that’s less than one-tenth the size of India – that makes it so good with art, sculpture, architecture, fashion and, indeed, automobiles.

If you can ever tear your eyes away from the GranCabrio’s sheer gorgeousness, take a minute to peek under its hood and there you’ll find a 4.7-litre V8 that produces a massive 440 horsepower and 490Nm of torque. Mated to a 6-speed ZF automatic transmission (manual gearshifts are also possible, via shift paddles mounted behind the steering wheel) that transfers power to the rear wheels, this engine provides proper, supercar-spec performance. The GranCabrio can accelerate from zero to 100kph in 5.4 seconds and, with its soft top closed, hit a top speed of 283kph. The best part is, the engine makes some really divine V8 noises – you’ll find yourself slowing, downshifting and accelerating hard, just to hear its loud, raspy, growl that rises to a roaring crescendo – over and over again.

Inside the GranCabrio’s four-seater cabin, you’re greeted with the kind of luxury that you might find in Italian ex-PM Silvio Berlusconi’s mansion near Milan. Yes, the one where he used to have his famous ‘bunga bunga’ parties and where, I’m sure, a lot of very interesting things happened all the time. But, seriously, the GranCabrio’s interiors really are a sumptuous mix of high-quality wood and leather and metal – it’s a delightful place in which to spend time, with every one of the high-tech toys that you may want and expect in a car that costs all of Rs 1.76 crore.

The GranCabrio isn’t only about beauty and luxury – it also offers a terrific driving experience. With its 1980kg kerb weight, stiff chassis and electronically-controlled, dynamically adjustable ‘Skyhook’ suspension, the Maserati behaves like a proper sports car should, offering excellent steering feedback, nimble and responsive handling and excellent high-speed stability. With the soft top closed and in sports mode, I did speeds of up to 270kph in the GranCabrio on the six-lane Noida-Agra Yamuna Expressway, and the car just shrugged it off, remaining rock steady at those insane speeds.

As you might expect, the GranCabrio is fitted with a raft of high-tech electronics that work quietly in the background, keeping you out of trouble at very high speeds. There’s MSP (Maserati Stability Programme) that works with the car’s ABS and EBD systems, keeping the car poised and stable at all times. The power-operated soft top takes less than half a minute to open or close and can be operated at speeds of up to 30kph. And at about 6-7kpl, even the fuel economy is not too bad for a V8-engined convertible sports car.

For those who want a slightly harder-edged version, the Maserati GranCabrio Sport is also available, on order, in India. Launched in mid-2011, the GranCabrio Sport features a slightly tweaked engine (power goes up by 10bhp, zero-to-100 kph time comes down to 5.2 seconds and top speed goes up to 285 kph…) and an improved air-conditioning system that automatically senses if the car is being used with the top up or down, and maintains the set temperature accordingly. The Sport also gets revised software for the transmission, revised exhaust system (more noise! Yes!!), upgraded brakes, new wheels, minor details changes to the interiors and some new colours.

Whether you choose the regular GranCabrio or the Sport, you get a beautifully-styled convertible Italian sports car that looks unspeakably divine, sounds awesome and goes like a runaway Sidewinder missile. It’s also very refined, luxurious and spacious enough for four adults. If I had Rs two crore in the bank, I’d sure buy one right now.

Note: I drove the Maserati GranCabrio in 2012 and wrote this article for MW magazine