2015 Bentley Continental GT review, test drive

What’s it like to drive?

The four engine options available – all twin-turbocharged with an eight-speed automatic and all-wheel drive – are the 500bhp V8, the 521bhp V8 S, the mighty 626bhp Speed and the classic W12. It’s this last engine that’s been given an upgrade this time around, with a bump in power from 567 to 582bhp, while torque from the 6.0-litre motor has gone up by 2kgm to 73.42kgm. Can you feel the extra power? Not really, and we’d need our testing equipment to tell you if it performs any differently. It now also gets cylinder deactivation (or Variable Displacement, as Bentley would like you to call it), which shuts down six out of the 12 cylinders when you don’t put too much stress on the engine. The result, Bentley says, is that the W12 can now manage around 640km between fill-ups, which if true, is pretty amazing for a 2.2-tonne petrol car. Of course, this cylinder-shutdown tech was always available on the V8 models, but interestingly, it’s not available on the range-topping W12 Speed. In practice, the transition from lowered displacement to firing on all cylinders is rather seamless in both engines, as it should be in a Bentley.
All the motors are more than capable of hurtling the big B along at a heady pace, although there’s no escaping the fact that the W12 cars do it far more effortlessly than the V8s. The 4.0-litre V8 does get one back by sounding a lot nicer though, and while you have to coax a roar out of the W12, a bark from the V8 is only ever a slight blip away, especially in the S. Speaking of which, the steering feels heavier in the V8 S than any of the others, and similarly, the air suspension, even in its softest setting, is firmer than the others at their sportiest. You might think this would have been true of the W12 Speed as well, but it isn’t. The 626bhp flagship is just as supple and easy to steer as the ‘standard’ cars, and its powertrain packs a silken wallop that truly belies its titanic proportions and weight. As its name states, the Continental is a GT or Grand Tourer, so handling is never going to match up to an out-and-out sportscar, but it feels supremely secure and planted on the road. It is, however, very wide, so if your grand tour finds you on narrow roads, you’d best be wary of oncoming traffic.