Bentley

The Bentley Continental Supersport blends luxury and performance. Photo / Supplied

Unlike new variants of production cars, Bentley's Supersport wasn't planned. It came, according to Bentley's head of exterior design Raul Pires, after the company's engineers began playing around.

As they were developing the Continental range, "the designers over-engineered, then we made a judgment call," Pires says. "We realised we could make an extreme Bentley."

Pires says the engineers worked on weight saving and technical changes, and it all went from there.

It sounds amazingly casual, but petrol just leaks from Bentley folk, they can't help themselves. So those engineers gave Pires a play in their altered GT to get the feel of it and he got to work, his changes largely mandated by technical tweaks to the standard Continental GT.

"A car is never too wide or too low," Pires says, pointing out the wider rear arches to accommodate a 50mm increase in track and beefier wheels. They underline the greater rear-drive bias - the torque split for the four-wheel-drive system now 40:60 front to rear.