New Bentley Continental GTC Speed features 600 hp and a few additional goodies.
The Bentley Continental GTC has gotten a facelift and a new sibling with a little more pepper under the hood. The Continental GTC now also comes as a GTC Speed with the W12 upgraded to 600 hp from the standard GTC’s 552. The new engine numbers now make this cabriolet able to max out at 200 mph (324 km/h), with the roof on, of course. With the roof down you lose about 5 mph – a real tragedy.
The Speed does the 0 to 60 mph sprint in 4.5 seconds, about 0.3 seconds faster than that slow poke, lumbering colossus, the regular, run-of-the-mill, discount, dollar store GTC. The Speed also gets a lowered suspension of about 10 mm, which is fancy, automotive engineer parlance for 1 centimeter. The ESP system adds a Dynamic mode for better cornering too.
The standard GTC also gets a new ESP mode called Sport Traction, in case you want to enter it in a WRC rally. Hey, wouldn’t it be something to take one of these half-million dollar Bentleys through a few stages of the Wales Rallye? Just a thought.
Optics get a do-over too, just barely. The GTC has a new front bumper, grill and larger air intakes. The Speed variant has larger exhaust pipes and gets 20-inch wheels. On the inside, a new steering wheel and Mulliner-spec quilted leather upholstery.
