The Continental

14 June 2019

If I had to cross a continent by car, the Bentley Continental GT is the car I would want to do it in. It is, without exaggeration, the most awesome car I have ever had the privilege of driving

As I approach the Bentley dealership I am excited. And not just a little bit. I am collecting the Bentley Continental GT. When I get through the briefing alerting me to all of the special features of this vehicle, and this takes half an hour because todat special is in abundance, I am ready for the off. I feel like I should be feeling some trepidation – in my hands is a motor worth 300 000 USD and at my feet there is the power of 600 horses. But there is no trepidation, no nervousness, just a school boy-like buzz.

Warp 330

The dealership is located on a highway, and so I’m immediately able to open her up and see what she can do. I was told that the test drive model is limited to a maximum speed of 220 Km/H, which is fine as I don’t plan on going anywhere near that fast. That said, I am not going to put in print how fast I actually did get her up to. All I will say is that unrestricted (and on a track, obviously), this car is capable of a top warp factor of 330 Km/H.

As I hit the highway, I am instantly in awe not just at the acceleration, but at the noise that accompanies. The soundtrack from the GT is loud, and there must be a special name for that throaty rasp as the auto gearbox selects the next gear for you. I don’t know what the name of that noise is, but I like it.

Whenever I test drive a car, I am always looking for a fault, somewhere, for balance. In this case, the only fault I notice in the first few minutes of being ensconced in this luxurious beast is that the view out of the rearview mirror seems limited. I soon learn though that the main purpose of the rearview mirror is to play a game where objects in it get very very small, very very quickly.

E = Effortless

As I adapt to my settings, and get into my stride, I realise something I was not expecting. This car, for many reasons, and despite the incredible power at hand, is actually the easiest car I have ever driven. It is big, it is worth a huge amount of money, but part of the investment is in the engineering, which means driving is effortless.

Taking this car along some of the winding roads of the outskirts of Kyiv, as well as the Kyiv-Odesa highway, means I really get to see what the 6000 BhP from the W12 engine means. Most cars will have a decent burst of acceleration from 30 or 50 Km/H: the Bentley has neck-breaking acceleration even from an already very rapid pace. Again, license threatening details will not be revealed.

The Bentley Safeguard

There is so much to say about the Bentley Continental that there is insufficient space in this small column to do it justice. Intelligent features, however, such as the ride height adjustment in case you counter a rough road, are abundant. The instrument/display panel is clear and easy to navigate and packed with a selection of things to make everything about this driving experience as perfect as is humanly possible.

Among the key safety features, important in a car like this, are warning indicators on the insides of the wing mirrors, which tell you when the car has sensed a vehicle in your blind spots. Another important safety feature is the Bentley Safeguard, where, if the car calculates you are approaching the rear-end of another vehicle too fast, an alert comes up between the gauges of the dash as well as on the heads-up display on the windscreen. I will admit, Bentley thought I needed safeguarding twice.

If I must summarise, all I can say is this: if you have managed to honestly earn enough money to be able to have one of these in your garage, I salute you and your excellent taste.

For the guys:

✔︎ Snaps knicker elastic at 100 yards

✔︎ Mind-numbing acceleration

✔︎ Exhaust note

For the girls:

✔︎ Stunningly beautiful

✔︎ Genuinely easy to drive

✔︎ Luxury. Luxury. Luxury!