This is the first Bentley four-door to top 200mph

Bentley’s four-door saloons have flirted with the idea of hitting 200mph before, but stopped short. If you needed to smash your Bentley through the double-tonne (speed) barrier, you needed a two-door Continental GT. Those days are over.

Yes, ready to transport the children (or butler) toward a speed nearly three times the UK's national limit is the new Flying Spur W12 S. As you’ve doubtless deduced, this is a Flying Spur with the ‘S’ treatment (honed suspension, and a power bump) applied not to the pauper’s V8 bi-turbo model, but the full-fat 6.0-litre W12. And the results are frankly massive. 

The recalibrated engine’s outputs have risen by 10bhp (to 626bhp) and 14lb ft (to 605lb ft), which in turn pushes the Flying Spur S onto a top speed of 202mph. Okay, a Ferrari GTC4Lusso is way faster and more powerful if you’re seeking warp-factor four-person transport, but it doesn’t have the aerodynamics of a telephone box holding it back.

Before drag starts to bother the Flying Spur S, it’ll charge from standstill to 60mph in 4.2 seconds, while the more Euro-friendly 0-62mph time is a slightly tardier 4.5 seconds. Again, very quick for a Bentley, but certainly not as pulverising as the Audi S8 Plus, a similarly plutocratic limo that can storm to 62mph in just 3.8 seconds. 

As well as the token power bump, the Flying Spur W12 S wear darker eye shadow around the headlights and a ‘Beluga’ tinted grille to give it a more menacing face. Yep, you know you’ve made it when your trim finishes are named after caviar. 

Meanwhile, you can spec a new set of 21-inch wheels, there’s a different steering wheel, and all the usual Bentley refinements on-board, including wi-fi, knurled gear-shift paddles and more quilted leather than Downton Abbey's smoking parlour.

No word on price yet, but this is a Bentley, so it’s probably the least relevant number on the entire spec sheet. After all, if you were in the market, you’d just have to have the S, wouldn’t you?