Bentley Bentayga: Give it a 20 million dollar corner

Test drive of the fastest, most powerful and most expensive SUV

The fastest, the most powerful and the most expensive – these are three epithets that can characterize the new Bentley Bentayga SUV. Maxim Cherkashin, editor of the Auto project, went to the Sochi Autodrom, where he tested the super crossover and found out who the potential buyer of a car costing almost 20 million rubles would be.

Where it’s always warm

Where luxury borders on kitsch, that’s the perfect place for a car like the Bentley Bentayga. Apparently, that’s why the Russian representative office of Bentley and the largest automobile holding in the South of Russia, Klyuchavto, decided to hold the Bentley Road Show in Sochi. Although they say Sochi has dark nights, the glitter and glow of the luxurious hotel lights sometimes eclipses any gloom, crisis, and poverty.

Here at Russia’s main resort, it’s warm and sunny almost year-round, and a car like the Bentayga looks quite at home. And the resort town’s residents have long been accustomed to luxurious and expensive cars on the streets of their city.

Sochi has always been known to flaunt its wealth and luxury; even our Olympics became one of the most expensive in the world, and most Russians were only able to see it on television. It’s exactly the same with the Bentayga crossover. Only a handful of Russians can even get into one, let alone afford one. Everyone else can only see it on television or online. Of course, when I received an offer to test drive the Bentayga super crossover, I naturally couldn’t refuse.

So, in the company of three more journalists from Krasnodar and Sochi, I arrived at the Sochi Autodrom, where the Bentley Road Show was taking place. Four Bentleys were parked in front of the entrance to the fashionable restaurant, their total value exceeds 100 million rubles. Two of them are the newest Bentayga crossovers, the other two are a Continental coupe and a Continental Flying Spur sedan. In a few minutes, I’ll get behind the wheel of one of these cars and speed around the Sochi Autodrom track. It will be the new Bentayga, its starting price starts at 16.5 million rubles. But the models presented for testing are generally approaching the 20 million ruble mark.

A mountain of luxury

Actually, while the car is parked, I’ll tell you a little about the crossover itself and what it is. Today, the Bentayga (in Russian it sounds like “Bentayga”) is the most powerful, most expensive, and fastest production SUV. It got its unusual name from a mountain in the Canary Islands, although the crossover was previously considered for the name Falcon.

The decision is understandable: the Bentayga’s appearance is more like a mountain crammed with electronics, precious woods, and a few calfskins than a bird soaring through the clouds. The car weighs 2.4 tons, so it’s definitely a mountain, not a soaring falcon. However, the six-liter W12 engine, with 608 hp and 900 Nm of torque, can accelerate such a colossus to 100 km/h in 4.1 seconds, and a top speed of 301 km/h—a very respectable result. However, the W12 engine is already familiar from other Volkswagen Group models, in particular, the Phaeton business sedan. All power is transmitted to the wheels via a ZF automatic transmission. A diesel engine is planned for the engine soon, however, this will be the first diesel engine in the entire history of Bentley.

e, it’s time to get behind the wheel. I open the massive door and find myself in the realm of luxury and in the arms of the Bentayga leather seat. High-quality leather trim and the ability to choose one of 15 interior colors are just as impressive, as is the ability to adjust the seats in at least nine positions. By the way, the seats are equipped with everything necessary for a comfortable journey: heating, massage and ventilation. Yes, there is more than enough luxury here. The most expensive wood – rosewood – is used for the interior trim of the stylish SUV, Karelian birch and some types of African mahogany, such as kevazingo and makore, are also popular. Polished wood panels are complemented by chrome moldings that run along the entire perimeter of the cabin.

And you can go fishing too

At first, when you get into the cabin, you can’t help but feel like you’re in a Porsche Cayenne or an Audi Q7, and this is not surprising: the car is built on the modular MLB platform.

The current generation of the Q7 is based on it, and the future generation of the Porsche Cayenne and Volkswagen Touareg will soon follow. To be honest, the Bentley Bentayga reminded me of the premium Vertu phones. Yes, they’re luxurious, yes, they’re expensive, but underneath, they’re still just a Nokia with a bunch of expensive, fancy gizmos thrown in.

By the way, one of the Bentayga’s gizmos is a leather fishing bench. I can picture a fisherman like him. He’d drive to the Don River or Taganrog Bay, open the trunk of his Bentley Bentayga, complete with leather bench, and take out some bloodworms, maggots, a jar of worms, and a bucket of oil cake. He’d also remember to scatter some jigs around the trunk and shove a couple of kilometers of nets and tackle in. He’d caught a carp or crucian carp and put it in his keepnet, but his hands were still slippery from the fish. No problem—he could wipe them off on the leather bench of the new Bentayga. But these are all jokes, I don’t think anyone in their right mind would go fishing in such a crossover.

By the way, there are a lot of expensive things here. For example, ashtrays in the rear armrests cost 450 euros. And if you really want to be surrounded by luxury, then Breitling is at your service to install a tourbillon in the Bentayga interior, equipped with a mother-of-pearl dial with Arabic numerals and eight diamond hour markers. The dial of the watch without the tourbillon is covered with black lacquer. The cost of such an exclusive watch is only 150 thousand euros. Mere trifles for the owner of a new Bentayga.

Big and heavy Ben

Of course, the new Bentayga is a kind of liner, stuffed with luxury. Everything here is expensive and rich. And how does it actually drive? The company claims it’s the fastest and most powerful production SUV. That’s why we’re at Sochi Autodrom. We enter the track through the pit lane and wait for the instructor’s command. Cleared to start, I cautiously drive out onto the track.

I’ve never driven an SUV on a racetrack before. Floor it, and the car begins to accelerate with a bass roar. It accelerates from zero to 100 km/h in just 4.1 seconds—an amazing result. Incidentally, the car comes standard with Launch Control, which means you press the accelerator down while holding the brake pedal, then release it, and the Bentayga fires off with a powerful kick, like a shell from a cannon.

With Launch Control, the British car can accelerate from zero to 100 km/h in 3.7 seconds. And the car is so soundproofed that you barely notice the speed at 200 km/h. As for handling, everything is fine. The Bentayga turns into corners precisely, the main thing is not to get carried away with the speed. In one of the hairpins, where you had to enter the corner at a speed of 100 kilometers per hour, I got a little carried away and entered it at a speed of 120.

For a split second it seemed to me that the Bentayga was about to fly off the track, but everything is fine. With screeching tires, I swerved sideways into the corner, not into the concrete barrier. Incidentally, sometimes you notice the car doing a lot for you, like braking when you’ve gone too fast, or steering if you can’t handle it yourself. The Bentayga is fast and powerful, so on the track, you have to get used to not so much its dynamics as the crossover’s weight. Don’t forget the laws of physics and get too carried away with speed.

The Bentayga can handle the track just as well as a sports car, but its main job is to carry the driver and passenger in comfort, and the crossover does this job with flying colors. And in terms of driver and passenger comfort, the Bentayga is indecently good. Even after moving to the back seat, I didn’t want to leave the car. Now I understand how millionaires feel when they buy cars like this. Judging by the figures announced during the event, there are plenty of people who want to buy a Bentayga. The quota for Russia, Azerbaijan, and Belarus is 300 cars, and they have all already been sold.

Source: ufocar