Bentley is a British automaker. In keeping with its long lineage of distinguished automobiles, it continues to create vehicles for people with refined tastes, and large wallets. They make a full line of cars from a two-door coupe to an SUV, all of them stuffed with plush amenities and incredible performance. One such esteemed vehicle in the lineup is the four-door Flying Spur. One sample of the Bentley Flying Spur just proved how capable its performance envelope is when it was used to perform a high-speed test run on the Autobahn. 

Where Bentley came from

Bentley is a company born back in 1919. Even back then, it understood the importance of a well-performing automobile. So, one of its early decisions was to pursue racing in order to enhance the performance of its engines. The effort paid off. Bentley would go on to win the famous 24 Hours d’LeMans in 1924, 1927, 1928, and 1929.

All these years later, Bentley is still manufacturing vehicles in England, but the company is owned by Volkswagen. Yeah, that Volkswagen. The German company. Even with the decades that have passed since its origin, and the recent change of ownership, the company still has remained true to its vision of maintaining high expectations with the performance envelope for their vehicles. This can be attested to by the recent video that was uploaded to Youtube.

About the video

The video begins with a Bentley Flying Spur on the side of the road. As the videographer begins the video, the Flying Spur starts up. The grumble from the W12 engine warbles through the air as the camera pans around the rear of the vehicle. Then, the car’s engine hits the rev limiter, and the four-door pulls away. The camera view switches to record the instrumentation on the dash. It is split-screened also with a GPS data collection interface on the right side of the screen. 

The end result of the multiple high-speed runs in the Bentley Flying Spur was a top speed of an astonishing 340 kilometers per hour, which translates to 211 miles per hour. The remarkable thing is, the car pulled pretty effortlessly to about 280-kph /173-mph before it seemed to flatten in aggressiveness. It still managed after that though, to slowly reach the 340-kph / 211-mph mark. 

The video is below. It is not long, but if you jump to the 2:30 timestamp, you will see the point where Bentley reaches the top end. 

Bentley’s top speed

It is interesting to note that the top speed mentioned on Bentley’s website is only 207-mph. This video clearly shows the instrumentation surpassing that point. Also interesting is that the vehicle did not beg or scream for mercy. The engine responded quite smoothly on the Autobahn runs with no clamor or warnings of possible impending trouble. 

The engine

The Bentley Flying Spur is motivated by a 6.0-liter, bi-turbo, W12 engine. It pumps out 635 horsepower. Zero-to-sixty is timed at 3.7 seconds. Its engine has also been used by Audi, Volkswagen, and Spyker. In the Flying Spur, the engine is mated to an eight-speed automatic transmission. 

To be fair, there is no indication in the video claiming that the Flying Spur is an unmodified car. Also, the instrumentation and GPS data do not show if they are from the actual Bentley shown at the beginning of the video. So, the video could be legit, but it could just as easily not be. In either case, it is entertaining to see something get to 340-kph / 211-mph, especially if it really is a four-door that weighs over 5,000 pounds. Would you agree?