Bentley's Incredibly Fast Sedan Is Worth The $200,000 Price Tag
The update on the Continental Flying Spur ("Continental" has been dropped from the name) is lower, wider, and a lot more powerful, thanks to a 6.0-liter, twin turbocharged W12 engine.
That's good for 616 brake horsepower and an impressive 580 pound feet of torque at 2,000 revs/minute.
The Flying Spur, which was teased earlier this month, will debut at the Geneva Motor Show in March, and make its first North American appearance at the New York Auto Show a few weeks later.
It can hit 200 mph and go from 0 to 60 mph in 4.3 seconds. That's incredibly fast, especially for a Bentley (these aren't sports cars), and even more impressive when the car's 6,546 pound gross weight is factored in. That's heavier than even the fattest version of the 2013 Range Rover SUV. (Side effect: Fuel economy goes out the window.)
Naturally, the interior is stuffed with all the hand-crafted leather (in 12 different colors) and wood veneers (choose burr walnut or dark fiddleback eucalyptus) any member of the elite could want.
(For interested parties, Bentley has also released a line of colognes that make you smell like the inside of a Bentley.)
For those who don't get to sit behind the wheel, the back seat is the place to be: There's a nine-liter bottle cooler in the central rear armrest, and two 10-inch LCD screens are fixed to the backs of the front seats, among many other luxury features.
Of course, that level of comfort and performance come with a price tag that is inflated by the Bentley "B" on the hood: They Flying Spur starts at $206,000.
Last month, we test drove Bentley's flagship sedan, the Mulsanne, and found that while the $347,000 price tag may be a bit steep, the way that having a Bentley name changed our lives made it worth it.
The Flying Spur will yield that same benefit, and add a sporty quality the Mulsanne is missing. How it handles remains to be seen, but as you can hit 60 mph in 4.3 seconds while your passengers sip on chilled champagne and watch movies on their own screens, the $200,000 price tag seems like a good deal.
