2018 Bentley Flying Spur V8 S~$250,710 Msrp~black Edition~mulliner~4500 Miles on 2040-cars

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Pre-Race notes from the 2015 Nurburgring 24-Hours

Autoblog has come to the German countryside to watch the Nurburgring 24-Hour race, and just one day in, we have to say it's outstanding. Le Mans has been the highlight of our summer racing schedule for the past few years, the 'Ring 24-Hour event being the appetizer we always skipped. Earlier this year, however, while visiting Miami to check out the Cigarette Racing 50 Marauder GT S, we met Scott Preacher. He oversees digital marketing for both Cigarette and AMG during the week, then comes to Germany to compete in the VLN race series on the weekends, driving an Aston Martin Vantage GT4 for Team Mathol. If Le Mans is the Oscars of endurance racing, the Nurburgring 24-Hour race is the Screen Actors Guild award – the one voted on by the actors, for the actors. In this case it's the race by the teams and fans, for the teams and fans, even though the increasing manufacturer presence has altered the team equation. We were told that it wasn't so long ago that true privateers could win the overall, but that's not really the case anymore. Front-running teams have heavy factory involvement – Audi Sport Team Phoenix, for instance, which finished in first and third last year, has its own 'Ring race center and is running the 2016 R8; Aston Martin is represented by Aston Martin Racing and Aston Martin Test Center, and Bentley has a Bentley Motors team and uses HPT to run another team. The fan component hasn't changed, though, and you can't talk about the race for more than 60 seconds before someone brings up the battalions of spectators. Every driver we spoke to cited them as the most incredible part of this race after the track itself. It feels to us like a giant German Sebring, with thousands of people camped out in the ginormous, forested infield, many of whom have been here since Monday erecting their ornate camping compounds. There will be parties everywhere Saturday night, and so much bratwurst on the grill that the drivers can smell it when as they're blasting full speed through Wehrseifen. Even when we drove a Mercedes S63 AMG Coupe on a lap before the race, the fans waved like it was a competition. Scott Preacher's Australian co-driver Robert Thompson said, "You come around a corner and it's like you're driving full speed through the middle of a carnival." The race field itself could also be called a carnival, with an officially invited field of more than 170 cars. Even on a track that's 24.4-km long, that's like racing on the 405 at midday.

Bentley announces its fifth model will debut May 10

Bentley announced it would debut "a fifth model" on Tuesday, May 10 to join the Continental GT, Continental GTC, Flying Speed and Bentayga. The notice included all kinds of wordplay suggesting extra length and roominess, Crewe members having "gone to new lengths" on the "long-awaited" vehicle that will bring "an extra dimension of on-board wellness," and so on. We can't be certain of what's coming, but we're willing to place a large wager that it's the extended-wheelbase Bentayga. A prototype of the stretched family conveyance with an enlarged wheelbase and grandiose rear doors was caught testing at various points throughout 2021. And the door card in the teaser vid matches that of the Bentayga, not that of the only other four-door Bentley makes, the Flying Spur. Step inside. 12:30 BST, 10.5.2022 pic.twitter.com/4H7YENbtTz — Bentley Motors (@BentleyMotors) April 29, 2022 We don't know how much additional knee space Bentley will grant to back-seat VIP types; were this another era, we're sure Bentley would never quantify it beyond "more ample." We'll find out on May 10. There could be other changes in store for the variant as well, the automaker promising "a breadth of capabilities beyond anything previously offered." If the teaser is correct, there's a nifty shade of purple on the way, too. Related video:

Bentley Speed Six Continuation Series revealed at Goodwood Festival of Speed

The Bentley Continuation series of cars is … continuing. Today, Bentley unveiled the Speed Six Continuation Series at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. This follows the series of 12 Bentley Blower Continuation models, but apologies youÂ’re only hearing about the new series now, as the 12 Speed Six units are already spoken for. Bentley says it regards the Speed Six as its most successful race car ever because it dominated Le Mans both in 1929 and again in 1930. Just like the Blower, the Speed Six will be built using the same processes as the original car by BentleyÂ’s bespoke and coachbuilding division, Mulliner. Bentley has 80% of the carÂ’s original drawings and is supplementing this knowledge with original mechanicÂ’s notes and data taken from an original 1930 Le Mans racer and a 1930 Speed Six currently residing in BentleyÂ’s Heritage Collection. The “6 1/2 liter” (as Bentley likes to term it) six-cylinder engine required the creation of over 600 new parts to build, and Bentley says initial dyno testing shows itÂ’s making 205 horsepower, which is 5 horses more than the original race engines were documented to produce. Bentley originally put this engine together as a successor to the Blower motor, as the thinking at the time from W.O. Bentley was that increasing displacement would produce better results than supercharging. Every last detail of the Speed Six Continuation Series is scrutinized to be as authentic as possible to the original. The one youÂ’re looking at in photos here is finished in Parsons Napier Green and features a tan leather interior. A total of five authentic colors will be available for the buyers to choose from, too. The craftspeople building the cars will be working alongside younger folks on purpose in an effort to pass down the skills and techniques used to create such vehicles. Before a single screw is turned, though, Bentley says it will be putting “Car Zero” through a real-world durability program with a goal of over 21,000 miles on the road and nearly 5,000 miles on the racetrack. Will any of the 12 customers ever get close to those figures? It sure would be cool if they did. As for those 12 lucky people who will own one of these Speed Six Continuation Series cars, theyÂ’ll all have custom sessions with the Mulliner team to get their cars customized and built to their specific wants. Each Speed Six will then take 10 months from start to finish to complete, and Bentley thinks production will be completed by the end of 2025.