Bentley Brooklands 2009 Pictures

Bentley Brooklands 2009 Pictures High Res

           

more bentley brooklands 2009 pictures...

Gimme More

When you get rich enough to live in la la land there is no car that better befits your seamlessly cool lifestyle than the Brooklands...

Words by: Danny Cobbs

Somehow, as the world faces an economic Armageddon, I’m finding it difficult to write about the virtues of a car costing upwards of £230,000. Yes, you read that correctly, £230,000 for a car. And that’s before you even look at the options list. Alright, it is a Bentley, and there’s only ever going to be (allegedly) a limited production run of just 550, but still, the question needs to be raised; can any car ever be worth this much money?

The short answer is; of course not. For the same money you could own most of Reykjavik now. However, this car isn’t for the likes of you and me. It isn’t even for the Wall St. bankers who could have once afforded one before they lost their jobs and now reside in a cardboard box under the pier. This is the ultimately status symbol for those who’s nett worth might have recently dropped by a couple of billion dollars, but it doesn’t matter because they still have several more billion where that came from. The Brooklands then, is undoubtedly set to become another trinket to grace the car stables of the Russian oligarchs and Saudi princes.

So to fully understand what this car is all about you have to slip into the handmade world of the super rich. You have to dismiss the other Bentleys too - the GT, GTC and the Flying Spur - they are relegated to a lower league. Once, these were the ultimate, must-have, fashion accessory for gansta rappers and wealthy nightclub owners the world-over. But lets not forget they did a wonderful job of catapulting Bentley from being a cottage industry into a serious player in the luxury car market. But the price of this phenomenal accomplishment has had a bit of an adverse effect. See, a Bentley GT isn’t cool anymore. It’s just too commonplace. And that’s the same story for the GTC and Flying Spur. Volume sales has compromised elitism - that’s conspicuous consumerism for you. The outlandishly costing Brooklands readjusts this, perhaps more so now than ever before as there is even fewer punters willing, or even able, to slap quarter-of-million quid down on the counter to buy one.

So what exactly does Mr Moneybags get for his money? Well, to start with he gets everything in seismic proportions, and not just in the sales-tag department. Not to put too finer point on it, the Brooklands is massive. So much so, Bentley blatantly boasts it’s ‘the roomiest 2-door coupe, ever.’ From bumper to bumper it measures over 17ft long and weighs nearly 3 tonnes. Not surprisingly, the interior is awash with enough leather and wood to send a dominatrix into paroxysm of pleasure. But the Brooklands is more than a stately home on wheels, it is a near-perfect balance between modernity and heritage. I say, near-perfect because it does have a flaw. In a straight line, the on-tap power from the twin-turbo, 6¾-litre hand-built V8 could launch the next NASA space station. A car this large, and this heavy, shouldn’t be capable of reaching 60 mph in five- seconds, but yet it does, and as quietly as a squeak from a church mouse with a sore throat. It all starts to get a bit messy when it’s thrown around a corner at speed. Even with the sports suspension setting turned on the 20” wheels loose a certain amount of grip (a lot) and it wallows horribly. But then again who’s seriously going to throw a Brooklands around a racetrack? Not the type of person liable to buy one. They’ll have a Porsche GT or Ferrari Scuderia for that sole reason.

The Brooklands then, is a reminder. A reminder that they’ll only ever be a few hundred in existence. A reminder I could never afford to buy one. A reminder they had the money to buy it in a the first place, and I didn’t. A reminder they live in a world where the only crunch in their lives is the type served to them for breakfast. Therefore the Brooklands is, and will remain, everything Bentley designed it for; not intended for the likes of me. But that still shouldn’t decry its existence. It is one the most exclusive, fabulously beautiful, quick, and ridiculous cars I’ve ever driven, and for all those reasons that is why Bentley will sell every single one they produce.

Engine: 6761cc V8

Transmission: 6-speed auto

Max power: 530bhp @ 4000rpm

Max Torque: 774lb ft @ 3200 rpm

Top Speed: 184 mph

0-62mph: 5.3 seconds

Fuel consumption: 14.3 mpg (combined)

Price: £230,000