2020 Bentley Flying Spur review: A truly sublime sedan

There is one thing basically proper about a British luxurious equipment dipped in the colour green. The shades may modify but in some way the historic truth is that it constantly just performs. From the minute I 1st laid eyes on the 2020 Bentley Traveling Spur you see listed here, clad in a colour referred to as Verdant, I felt all was proper in the earth. (Editors’ note: This was months back, when optimism was nevertheless doable.)

But the clean seem of this automobile just isn’t just about the paint, it can be also about the trim. This automobile capabilities the so-referred to as Blackline Specification, which turns the machine’s standard brightwork dark and creates a extra muted, modern day seem.

So it can be a mix of the outdated and the new, then, and that is the moral of the tale listed here with the 2020 Traveling Spur: A classic brand putting out a modern day sedan into a earth more and more comprehensive of SUVs — machines like the bigger Bentley, the Bentayga.

So how can a automobile like the new Traveling Spur compete? It can be a tough street to climb, but it begins off effectively with an total design that is putting and dynamic with no any cues that shout for your focus. Of course, these infinitely faceted headlights are much from delicate, however in some way even they look a lot less lurid when cloaked in darkened trim.

Those people lights and that nose are like these observed on the new Continental GT, previewed way again on the 2015 EXP 10 Velocity six, and seem at least as superior listed here on a 4-door entire body. Here, it can be the more robust, sharper strains that established the Traveling Spur apart, particularly the crease that defines the rear fender.

The cues are common adequate to make the “Bentley” textual content throughout the rear unwanted, however the Traveling Spur has its possess, unique form on the outside the house. On the within, items are a little bit extra common — regular, even — with the normal Bentley quilted leather-based and knurled switchgear quickly observed. It can be cliche, but even though you will never uncover anything uncomfortable to contact on the within, that just isn’t to say everything’s excellent.

Of course, every little thing from the weighted steel plungers for changing the vents to the attractive 3D leather-based door playing cards are sublime, but some of the technologies listed here is troubling. The rear seats feature a trio of tablets, the outer two running Android Lollipop — now six several years and six variations outdated. Their dated, clunky interfaces are a stark contrast to the modern day cellular phone your ordinary rear-seat inhabitant would carry, but they’re the only way to entry the car’s infotainment method from the (in any other case stellar) again seats.

Up entrance, the Traveling Spur’s infotainment method is useful and clean, giving most of the modern day capabilities you’d be expecting like passably superior voice recognition and Apple CarPlay, but alas, no Android Automobile. The ideal feature of the Bentley method, however, is that when you want to just unwind and drive, at a contact of a button the full 12.3-inch show (referred to as, of system, the Bentley Rotating Screen) pivots and hides at the rear of the sprint, replaced with a few clean, analog gauges.

When flipped like this, you get started to recognize just how distracting a massive, modern day digital show can be. I astonished myself by preferring to drive the automobile with it tucked away. Likewise, Bentley has done a fantastic task of earning the digital gauge cluster at the rear of the wheel seem elegant and simple inspite of nevertheless giving all the data you have to have for your drive.

And what is it like to drive? Far more sprightly than you could consider. Built on the very same primary system of the Porsche Panamera, the Traveling Spur has some basically superior dynamics, aided by a rear-steering method that nearly shortens the wheelbase. The result is much extra nimble than you’d be expecting when you 1st sink into the plush driver’s seat and grip the fat, upright steering wheel.

Considerably extra keen than you could be expecting, way too, thanks to the six.-liter W12 below the hood. The latest taste of this now-venerable motor is up to 626 horsepower in the 2020 Traveling Spur, paired with 664 pound-ft of torque. Tack on a sleek however fast-shifting ZF eight-pace twin-clutch transmission and an 40/sixty entrance/rear-split all-wheel-drive method, and you can get on your own to sixty mph in just 3.7 seconds.

Of course, it can be legitimately fast, but every time I essentially try to consider advantage of that general performance, I truly feel like I am missing the place. It can be superior to know that form of pace is on-tap, but to me the Traveling Spur is ideal loved when remaining in the default “Bentley” mode, just labeled with a B. Here, the suspension is compliant, the transmission feels sleek and all the several cares of the earth are just that tiny little bit farther away.

Pushed like this you can also have a better possibility of hitting the car’s EPA-rated 12 miles for every gallon city and 19 mpg highway, with a put together figure of just 15. I essentially did a little bit better, scoring 17 mpg as I mainly wafted my way by my 7 days with the automobile. But, if you can afford the $214,600 starting off cost of the Traveling Spur, or certainly the $289,850 of the automobile analyzed listed here (which include a $2,725 spot charge and $72,525 in options), likelihood are you will never be way too bothered by gasoline economic system.

Irrespective of how you drive it, or how you spec it, the Traveling Spur is a amazing package. It can be delicate visible appeal is backed by a gratifying drive and all the polish you could want or be expecting. It is, then, a consummate Bentley, and the form of sedan that with any luck , will make people today imagine twice just before bringing however another SUV to bear.