Category: Exotic Sports 
Price Range: No data available
Brilliant power delivery from monster engine, beautifully appointed interior.
Still looks too ordinary, some ride comfort has been sacrificed.
Not quite as captivating as it seems on paper, but impressive and likeable nonetheless.
The new Bentley Continental Flying Spur Speed has a list of attributes almost as long as its preposterously convoluted name. This means that it also has something of a split personality: on the one hand, it's a luxury limousine and, on the other, the world's fastest saloon, capable of posting times to make a few supercars blush.
But established historical precedent - and, more importantly, the basic laws of physics - tells us you cannot have your automotive cake and eat it. Supercars need stiff, unyielding suspension to contain and exploit their potential; luxury cars need soft, compliant springing to cosset those inside. A limousine is necessarily a heavy car, full of life's little (and not-so little) luxuries, but as any engineer will tell you, there is no greater enemy of the truly sporting car than weight.
Bentley's strategy for turning the outstandingly capable luxury express that is the Flying Spur into something altogether harder edged relies on one crucial element - its mighty 6-litre, twin-turbo, W12 motor. Not satisfied with the 553bhp it gives in normal tune, it receives the same 600bhp tune-up given to the Continental GT Speed last year. Torque, the force you feel when you accelerate, is increased by an even greater margin.
Complementing this change is a stiffer and lower suspension, a bespoke 20" wheel covered with tailor-made, ultra-high performance Pirelli tyres and the (£10,000) option of carbon ceramic brakes that not only knock a not-insignificant 10kg of weight off each corner of the car, but are also guaranteed to last the life of the car.
Visual changes include a restyled nose with a more upright grille and wider lower intakes, a more rounded rear end, huge rifled exhausts, a three spoke steering wheel and distinct 'Speed' decals on the kick plates. Without the brakes, the car costs £133,300.
The standard Flying Spur continues and benefits from most of the cosmetic updates enjoyed by the Speed (although its grille is bright and shiny, not dark and mean like the Speed's) but while the Speed's suspension has been stiffened, so has the normal Spur's been softened, to improve further the ride quality and also help bring some added differentiation between the two. Both cars also receive a welcome package of refinement-enhancing measures which, says Bentley, now makes the Flying Spur the quietest car in its class, regardless of which engine is located under that vast, proud bonnet.
