The Maserati Sebring
Matured to perfection; appreciating rapidly

3500 GT

When the Maserati 3500 GT was launched in 1957, it was a bolt from the blue. Up to that point, there had only been three Maserati models for the road; the largest, the A6G54 Gran Turismo, had a 2-liter straight six engine giving a top speed of just over 120 mph, and 60 examples were sold. The 3500 GT was a huge leap forward – the engine was still a straight-six but it now put out some 220 hp, enough to propel the luxury coupe to over 135 mph. In 1958, its first full year of production, it exceeded the entire A6G54 production four times over.

Maserati Sebring

How to improve on the sumptuous coupe? Well, one answer came at the request of the Shah of Persia: the engine was replaced with a race-derived 5-liter V8, the running gear was upgraded to handle the extra power and the legendary 5000 GT was born. Another answer came in 1962, when the Maserati Sebring was presented at the Geneva Motor Show. This was a more down-to-earth development, one that did not require the financial resources of a Middle East potentate to acquire.

Soon after the 3500 GT made its debut Ing. Giulio Alfieri, the chief engineer at Modena, set to work on creating the next generation of Maserati coupe. He took much inspiration from the 3500 GT Spyder, which had been styled by Giovanni Michelotti, while retaining much of the look of the original car. The front featured what was becoming the signature Maserati look: a wide, low-slung oval grille with the Trident proudly mounted front and center, pushed aggressively forward beyond the headlights. If you think that sounds familiar, then you’re right – that describes the nose of both the current Quattroporte and GranTurismo models.

The oval grille with its chrome surround was flanked by four strong headlights, two either side, which emphasized the powerful look of the Sebring. The hood featured a narrow air intake slot, a styling trait which had first appeared on the A6G back in 1950; and while the wheelbase was virtually unchanged from its predecessor, the cabin was extended further back to make the new coupe a genuine 2+2. As part of the restyling the cabin gained a B pillar behind the doors, while the C pillar was slimmed down from the sizable version used on the 3500 GT. The trunk had lost the vestigial fins of the earlier car, the flat rear deck leading to a squared-off rear end; the two exhaust pipes jutting out served notice of the car’s power.

That power came from the same 3.5-liter engine used in its predecessor, although fuel injection was now fitted as standard – peak power remained the same 220 hp, although the fuel injection gave benefits in both torque and fuel consumption. A five-speed transmission was fitted, and a contemporary road test recorded a 0-60 mph time of 8.5 secs. Maserati showed that it was on the leading edge by equipping the car with disc brakes on all four wheels; there was even a three-speed automatic transmission available on request, reputedly the first Italian car to have such a modern convenience. Air conditioning was also on the options list, a real novelty in the early 60s.

Mechanically, the Sebring remained largely unchanged throughout its six-year production life, although the engine grew to just over 4 liters by increasing both bore and stroke; power rose in stages to an impressive 265 hp, taking top speed to almost 160 mph, making the Sebring a practical coupe with supercar performance. The styling was also subjected to some minor tweaks over the car’s life; the hood air intake became a little narrower, the twin headlights were given an oval surround in place of their individual chrome trim rings, the rear lights went from a vertical stack to horizontal, and the front fender vent was moved up to the top of the wheel arch and given louvers.

This was the first Maserati to be given a name – the ‘Gran Turismo’ moniker attached to the earlier 1500 and 2000 models was descriptive of their function. It was named to celebrate Maserati’s success in the 1957 Sebring 12 Hours; one of the premier road racing events in the world, it was won by Fangio and Behra in a Maserati 450S. Four-door Maseratis have always been called Quattroporte; functional, descriptive yet oh-so-lyrical in Italian. Following the Sebring, the Mistral coupe began a tradition of naming Maserati coupes after winds.

A total of 600 Sebring cars rolled out of the Modena factory, which might seem a little disappointing compared to over 2,200 examples of the 3500 GT. However, for most of its life the 3500 GT was the only road car offered by Maserati; a year after the Sebring was launched, both the first Quattroporte sedan and the Mistral coupe were unveiled, and over the last couple of years of production, the Sebring was being sold alongside the Mexico and Ghibli models, with their lusty V8 engines. Having long been an almost overlooked chapter in Maserati’s long and storied history, auction prices for the Sebring are now climbing, on the rare occasion when one is offered for sale. With its heritage as the worthy successor to the 3500 GT, no wonder the Sebring is becoming one of the most collectible of historic Maseratis.