Aston Martin DB11 vs Bentley Continental GT Speed - grand tourers compared

The Continental GT Speed appears to hold the balance of size and power, prising 626bhp from 6.0 litres and an astonishing 619lb ft of torque, compared with the 600bhp and 516lb ft offered by the 5.2-litre DB11. But once you’ve offset that against the Bentley’s immense 2320kg kerb weight, it is the comparatively dainty 1910kg Aston – if that word can be used in the context of a car that still weighs close to two tonnes – that looks far and away the most potent.

Entering the Aston directly from the Bentley fuels the narrative suggesting that for all they have in common in terms of power, price and apparent positioning, these two represent very different takes on the classic British grand touring theme. You fall so far from Continental to DB11 that you might think it was actually a Bentley Bentayga from which you’d recently arrived.

The Bentley cabin architecture, so effortlessly cool in 2003, now looks fusty in its traditionalism. Its shapes are as attractive as ever, but in its analogue dials and Neolithic multimedia system lie the most telling evidence of the car’s age.

Bentley Continental GT Speed cabin

Aston Martin DB11 cabin

It’s tempting to praise the DB11 cabin to the skies simply because an adult of above-average height can now find a comfortable driving position, the instruments are actually legible and the nav no longer makes you want to commit an act of physical violence on the car. In fact, it would have been scandalous had the DB11 not improved on these, the DB9’s very worst characteristics. But even by the standards of today, this is a good Aston Martin cabin. Its look is modern without attempting the self-consciously avant-garde, and although the ancillary control switches and main infotainment display betray their Mercedes-Benz roots too readily, they all work intuitively and effectively. Compared with the competition from Bentley and, more broadly, Maserati and Ferrari, it’s an effective solution, albeit one that’s unlikely to trouble the new Porsche Panamera, whose state-of-the-art interior architecture is likely to play a prominent role in next year’s all-new Continental GT.

Both cars have rear seating that’s close to unusable for most. The Bentley is better and has the bigger boot but, in both cases, unless those up front are of compact proportions, the area behind the seats should be regarded as additional storage space.

The Aston’s new engine is louder than the Bentley’s on start-up, but quieter by far than the DB9’s, a trait you might not like but the neighbours will undoubtedly love. While the Continental must satisfy itself with brewing up indistinct, far-off thunder under its bonnet, the DB11’s voice is sharp, layered and unmistakably that of a V12. It doesn’t sound turbocharged at all.

There will be time for ambling later, but now we must drive hard. Why? Because this is the most gently sprung Aston in history and you need to know if, despite such softbottomed settings, it still drives like an Aston should. So here is a DB11 and there is a mountain; it’s time to throw one at the other.

You may find yourself letting out a little gasp within the first five seconds and a rather larger one when you park the DB11 at the top. The first comes courtesy of the sheer speed of the thing. The stats say it’s not much quicker off the line than the Bentley, but the stats don’t know how much of the Bentley’s getaway pace is down to power and how much to traction. But your backside knows instantly. The Conti is properly, majestically quick, but the Aston at full chat will elicit small involuntary noises from its occupants, and the Bentley can’t quite do that. Nor can its unconventionally arranged 12 cylinders come close to the symphonic snarl of the Aston’s. The DB11 motor only really feels turbocharged in its slightly tardy throttle response at very low revs. The rest of the time it’s as convincing  a turbo installation as I’ve tried, and I’ve driven the Ferrari 488 GTB.

The next task is to decide the best speed at which to angle some two tonnes of DB11 (with me on board) into a tricky, off-camber curve. The weight, wheelbase and spring rates all advise a conservative approach, but the confidence with which the car has addressed the road so far says something different. So you go with your gut and are rewarded by all the poise, grip and balance you could have hoped for – more, in fact, than you could reasonably expect from a car like this. By keeping it soft but abbreviating excess body movement with damper software as good as I’ve encountered, Aston’s chassis engineers have done what would have been impossible until very recently. The ride is beautiful, yet the body control at high speed in a difficult corner is superb. With steering that is quick, precise and more feelsome than you might expect of Aston’s first electromechanical system, it makes placing the car accurately an automatic process, which, on a road such as this, is probably the single greatest determinant of not merely how fast you go but also how much fun you have going fast.

That the Bentley doesn’t simply give up in the face of such an assured performance says all you need to know about how far this car has come over the years. Driving it fast is a less natural process, because you’re inclined to mentally divide the road into straights and corners rather than look at it as one organic whole. You barrel along the straights but over-stop the car for each curve, because the car is bigger and less wieldy than the Aston and it feels it. So you play to its strengths, turning in carefully but reapplying the power earlier to exploit its fabulous traction. In its own serene way, this, too, is fun, albeit less for what you’re doing and more for what you’re doing it in. But the Aston is the better driver’s car, and by an appreciable margin.

But can it cruise as well the Bentley? Yes and no. The DB11 has the best ride quality of any car of this kind I can recall, and it’s quiet enough for a 500-mile day to be relished rather than endured. The Bentley is probably a little quieter, and although its ride is much improved over that of early versions, it’s not as deft as the Aston’s. But you do feel impregnable inside the Bentley, on board one of the best-built cars on earth. There’s probably not a car out there in which you’d feel much safer or more secure than the Conti, and for all its talents, the Aston can’t do this. Even allowing for this DB11’s pre-production status and therefore forgiving the dashboard squeak and wind rustle that stalked us from start to finish, it feels assembled from components like a normal car, not hewn from solid like the Bentley.