Launched at the 2001 Frankfurt Show the Maserati Spyder marked the return of the Maserati brand to the North American market where Forbes Magazine crowned the Spyder with it’s Best GT of 2001 accolade.

The Spyder shares a shortened version of the Tipo M138 platform and running gear of it’s contemporaneous Coupé sibiling.

The push button operated soft top will stow or deploy in 30 seconds, despite it’s shorter length chassis strengthening raises the overall weight of the Spyder by 140 Coupé.

Despite the weight difference the performance of the Coupé and Spyder are virtually identical some testers finding the Coupé faster while other found the Spyder, such as the 2002 example seen here at the Bristol Italian Auto Moto Festival, to be quicker.

Both variants were replaced by the Maserati Gran Turismo in 2007.

Thanks for joining me on this “Forbes Best GT” edition of “Gettin’ a li’l psycho on tyres” I hope you will join me again tomorrow when I’ll be looking at “biggest automotive waste of time, money and engineering expertise ever built”. Don’t forget to come back now !