Gone in 60 Seconds?

Before I left for Korea, I decided to put my cars into storage. The facility I chose is located in Sausalito, CA (about 10 minutes north of San Francisco) and specializes in the storage of classic cars. One perk about this place is that they've installed over 10 cameras inside the facility that you can control to view your car remotely via a Java-applet enabled website. Just for kicks, I panned the camera around the garage to see what else was in there. The following are webcam stills of what I found.

Sitting pretty, itching to be driven...

Zooming out, can you spot the twins?

Panning to the left, my car suddenly becomes vastly inferior
(Ferrari F430 on top and 911 Turbo below it).

Panning around to the other side, I found this Shelby Cobra.

In the other garage sits the S2000.

This place also trickle-charges your battery upon request.

Zoom out a bit and the inferiority complex again ensues
(Aston Martin DB9 on the left, Ferrari 360 Modena on right)

Pan a bit to the left to find a beautiful classic Porsche below
(who cares about the crappy Boxster, really?)

A bit more to the left to find a classic Ferrari, Z8,
SLK55 AMG and early model Porsche (clockwise).

Panned to the other side and found another S2000 and two early model Porsches.

A bit more to the right to find yet another early model Porsche.

Needless to say, if the crew from the movie "Gone in 60 Seconds" were to find this garage, mine would be last on their list of cars to steal.

Downshifting into 3rd

Ah, how I miss driving my S2000. Cruising along on the highway in 6th gear (where the S is fairly tame) at an unsuspecting 60mph. Step on the clutch and downshift it directly into 3rd gear and the RPMs jump up to 7,000 rpm (where the S2000 transforms into a complete beast), at which point I realize that I still have 2,000 rpm left until I hit redline. Once I reach it, I shift into 4th and come to the realization that I'm going well over 100mph with two gears still left to go. Words can't describe the sound or the feeling.

Maserati Quattroporte

Continued from "Maserati Purchase" entry...

With a starting price of $112,500, the Quattroporte (which literally means "four doors") competes with the likes of BMW's 750iL, Audi's A8 and Mercedes' S-class. It's offered in three trim levels: the $112,500 Quattroporte, $122,400 Executive GT and $121,100 Sport GT, the last being the one I test drove.

Initial impressions: By the exterior alone, the Quattroporte is immediately set apart from it's more conventional competitors in styling alone. Having Ferrari roots (Maserati and Ferrari are one in the same company), its Pininfarina (the Italian automotive design firm hired by Ferrari to design most of its cars) styling queues are unmistakable. However, the most notable aspect about this car (to me) was the way it sounded; like a Ferrari with four doors, which is really what this car is. The note that comes out of the exhaust at open throttle is somewhat unexpected from such a large sedan, and will undoubtedly earn the hearts of overpaid automotive enthusiast-execs the world over.

Driving dynamics: The engine in the Quattroporte is a variation of the one used in the Ferrari F430; a 4.2L V8 mated with a 6-speed transmission (which was improved this year) good for 400 horsepower and a 0-60 time of 5.6 seconds. I obviously had some reservations in driving this car hard, as crashing it would have meant selling all of my possessions to cover its cost. However, I can say that it's nimble and very willing to execute on the wishes of your right foot. The shifts via the paddles were crisp and immediate, given the bias that I generally don't like paddle shifting.

Time for the $1M question: if I had $130,000 to drop on a luxury sedan, would I buy this car? One pro is that unlike A8s, 750s and S-classes, you don't see too many of these in the parking lot of your local Silicon Valley Starbucks. Other pros are its Ferrari lineage and again, the way it sounds. Cons are that there isn't much in-cabin tech (the sat-nav does the job and that's about it), which was most likely intentional, as the Italians want to focus more on the drive. At the end of the day, I think I would take an Audi S8 (lots of in-cabin tech, indisputable S-line performance) and pocket the remaining $30,000. Sorry BMW, the styling of the 7 series still turns me off.