CONTINENTAL Shift
Stepping out of a latest-spec Bentley Flying Spur recently, I was struck by the thought that whatever you might think about the automotive choices of Premier League footballers, the Volkswagen Group has done a pretty effective job of returning Bentley to the spirit of its glory years. The modern-day Spur is simply unique, its W12 engine providing a savage thrust the equal of pretty much no other large saloon, yet all delivered with impossible levels of refinement that makes you wonder why anybody would ever bother with a cramped, impractical supercar.
The general complexity of the modern cars may be light years away from Bentley’s models of the 1950s, but there is a parallel between the modern-day Spur and the R-Type Continental we’re experiencing here. At launch, this was quite simply the fastest fourseater luxury saloon in the world.
Basis of the car was obviously the R-Type, which was essentially a facelifted version of the MkVI, itself the first new
