Yahoo Autos The Mercedes-AMG GT Was Born to Be a Convertible
The Mercedes-AMG GT is the perfect sports coupe. It's stylishly brash, equal parts flamboyance and serious performance. It's built for a freewheeling life, the kind of impromptu elegance that doesn't necessitate a back seat or a cavernous trunk.
Clearly, it was bound to become a convertible.
The GT C Roadster debuted at the Paris Motor Show earlier this year, but today at the L.A. Auto Show we got our first chance to really pore over the thing. It's a stunner. Rare is the coupe that makes the transition to convertible so naturally. Modern design proportions lead to some unavoidable weirdness when the roof comes off-witness the Lamborghini Huracán Spyder, whose folding canvas roof traces a nearly horizontal arc between the windshield and rear bulkhead.
The GT C Roadster features no such oddities. Credit Mercedes designers with making a traditional coupe in a world gone increasingly fastback. With the roof up, the Roadster has the classic proportions of drop-top Benzes of yore. With the top stowed, it beckons you to hop in and drive.
Modern gearheads have a certain distrust of the drop-top sports car. Publications like this one, that focus on torsional rigidity and reduced curb weight over seemingly everything else, have doubtless had a hand in this.
But there's joy in the drop top. Especially when it's packing 550 horsepower from a rip-snorting twin-turbo V8 that sounds way too NASCAR to come from Affalterbach. This car may have enough AMG GT R electronic LSD and rear-steer trickery to slice and dice a racetrack, but it's a grand tourer at heart.
Imagine the thrill of hopping in this thing, firing up that thunderous V8, and jaunting off for the weekend to some cozy country rendezvous. In front of you, a hand-built powerhouse crouched under an impossibly long hood. Behind you, just enough luggage to be classy, without verging into cumbersome. Above you, nothing but wide-open sky, with the occasional buckshot downshift to startle the wildlife.
Coupes are grand. Rear-drive muscle-coupes with in excess of 500 horsepower and fat sticky tires are especially grand. But some cars were simply meant to be enjoyed al fresco. And here at the L.A. Auto Show, it's hard to find a car more suited to toplessness than the AMG GT. We're certain the lucky, wealthy, carefree few who get to live that life will agree.
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