RIPPING UP THE DUNES

IT’S HARD NOT TO SMILE WHEN YOU’RE BEHIND THE WHEEL OF A MASERATI

The man picking me up from the airport wears an infectious grin — a rare commodity at five in the morning. Hopping into the driver’s seat, his relatively minor frame makes the steering wheel of his Maserati Quattroporte S look enormous. The hulking dashboard — wrapped in beautiful leathers and underlined by splashes of metal — encases him, while in the back I crack into the cold water. Dubai is damn hot.

The Quattroporte is a bit old these days. The current sixthgeneration model is four years old, but looks a lot like the fifth generation before it — a platform introduced in 2002.

The wind noise is strong, some of the plastics and buttons look and feel like FCA hand-me-downs, and headroom in the back is sorely lacking. But, it feels like everything you’d imagine a Maserati to be. You sink into the rear seats like they’re made of butter, turning only to make eye contact with those driving by. Even just sitting in the back, I can tell the driver is having fun jabbing the throttle through the intermittent morning gridlock.

No wonder he is grinning. See, this is what we’ve long loved from Maserati. For each of the blemishes and shortcomings in its cars, there’s always a nugget of motoring Nirvana gold present to save the day.

But the vibe around the Levante is different.

Reception for the manufacturer’s first SUV has been largely mixed since it launched last year. Journalists have been quick to commend its abilities as a thoroughly fun SUV, but Maserati