See pics of the Bentley Continental GT in action

What's it like?

It’s a very successful revision of a great car. Bentley builds its cars beautifully, and this new interior only improves the standard. The car looks good, too, though it’ll take you a few views to appreciate the improvements fully. The lengthened nose and ‘prouder’ grille make a big difference, and the stance is improved by the wider tracks too.

But it’s the driving that’s different. Bentley claims refinement improvements - lowered bump and road noise; controlled wind noise courtesy of double-glazing - as the big issues, but there are other benefits. Great efforts have been made to reduce steering friction, and refine the car’s geometry so that it has brilliant high-speed stability, yet excellent near-centre steering sensitivity.

There was always great cornering grip, and it's made better because the tracks are wider, but this heavy car will now throttle-steer much better than previously, something that belies its 2.3-tonne mass.

The combination of 15bhp more from the flex-fuel engine and a reduction of 65kg overall improves the power-to-weight ratio by a useful six per cent. The car now sprints from 0-60 mph in just 4.6sec, and to 100mph in just over 10sec, even though it’s geared to do 198mph flat out.

If the car now has a foible, it’s the heavy fuel consumption and faint signs of age from its mighty W12 engine, which isn’t quite as good, and doesn’t sound quite as nice, as the very best modern engines in this price bracket.