Steve Sutcliffe - Quick thinking East meets West in a Maserati

摘要

Last week I spent some time with the good people from Maserati, and over a plate of pasta the conversation turned - as it so often does when talking to the makers of exotic motor cars nowadays - to China. Maserati's sales are up by around 130 per cent "over there" year on year, and they don't look like slowing down any time soon. Which is the good news. The less good news is that the average Chinese car journalist is, according to Maserati, not entirely talented when it comes to the things that matter most, such as what the various pedals do down in the foot well of a car and how to use a steering wheel correctly. In fact, just keeping a test car on the straight and narrow appears to present our brethren from the Far East with a challenge - as the dismayed engineers from Maserati discovered recently when an eminent Chinese motor noter visited the factory and went for a spin in a Quattroporte GTS. Literally.