Maserati GranTurismo Trofeo: the long way home

Received at court

The court has met many cars under showroom lighting, but very few that fought the lighting and won. At Maserati Sydney, beneath the neon trident glowing overhead like a family crest, a GranTurismo Trofeo in red held the entire floor to ransom. The founder's camera came out before the pleasantries did, which around here is the highest form of curtsy. Some cars are displayed. This one was enthroned.

The heart of a champion, the manners of a diplomat

Beneath that gloriously unhurried bonnet sits a twin-turbo V6 with serious lineage, derived from the Nettuno engine that powers Maserati's mid-engined royalty. That matters, because it means the GranTurismo is not merely handsome, she is quietly ferocious. Trofeo is Maserati's word for "the fast one", and having stood beside her, the court believes every syllable.

But here is the genius: she remains a grand tourer in the truest, oldest, most romantic sense of the phrase. Four seats. Actual, usable, bring-the-whole-court seats. This is a car built for the drive that takes all day on purpose, the one where lunch is three postcodes away and dinner is in a different climate. Plenty of fast cars ask you to suffer for the privilege. This one asks only that you cancel your afternoon, and possibly your Tuesday.

And she is beautiful in the way Maseratis have always been beautiful, which is to say effortlessly, as if elegance were simply the factory setting.

The crowning

Four crowns, and the court wishes to be very clear about the arithmetic. Nothing was deducted. The fifth crown is not missing, it is merely waiting, because you cannot fully crown a grand tourer inside a grand showroom, however flattering the neon. A car like this must be judged by the only measure her kind respects: a thousand-kilometre road trip, which the court has already begun manifesting. Dawn departure. Coastline strongly preferred. Back seats occupied by the two most fortunate souls in the realm. When she returns from that pilgrimage, we suspect the fifth crown will be sitting on the passenger seat, polished and ready.

Until then: four crowns, one red dress, and a standing invitation to the open road.

Long may she run, and may every road she chooses be the scenic one.