Ferrari Roma v Aston Martin DB11 AMR v Bentley Continental GT | The world's best grand tourer?

[Music] imagine you wanted the world's best gt car your choices until recently may have come from bentley or aston martin but now it also includes perhaps the most evocative automotive brand on the planet it's the new ferrari roma but is it a choice over an aston db11 or a bentley continental gt okay welcome to the interior of the continental gt and of these three cars if you want luxury this is the place to be and it's primarily because of the material quality the stitching on here is lovely and you you don't have to have this like cyan metallic blue which looks a little bit like the colors you might paint a dodgem you can have metal or you can have wood or you can have whatever you like to make it a bit more discreet now there's a reason i have not turned it on yet and that reason is because look luxury means that if you can see that i actually get my seat belt presented to me rather than just me having to reach around that is that is what this this car is about it does things for you so you don't have to do them yourself this screen flips around but you don't have to have it on you can have the full radio too you can have the full touch screen or you can just flip it around and if you want totally luxury i want to do nothing i want to be undisturbed you just have those little dials ticking away in the background there are a lot of switches in here and i am okay with that there is quite a lot to do on the touchscreen but there are quite a lot of physical buttons and once upon a time you'd have said oh no that's a bit that's a bit naf but actually compared to using a touchscreen it's so much easier to have proper actual physical buttons especially when they're as nicely finished as most of the stuff is all right some of the scattered stuff on here doesn't look great but actually in terms of material quality and feel things like these organ stop air vents and the knurling on here it's all really exquisitely really lovely this feels like the most luxurious car of the three okay so the bentley has the most luxurious interior no question but does that translate to the way that it drives well yes in short is the answer this is a big car it's a wide car it weighs 2100 kilos plus partly because it's got all of this stuff inside it the engine is inaudible unless you really want it to be this is bentley's twin turbo v8 if you don't want it to be it does make a nice sort of really bellowy bassy v8 noise but most of the time it's kind of inaudible it drives through a twin clutch gearbox which is sort of unusual for a luxury oriented car but because bentley is part of the volkswagen group and volkswagen wants to use this platform and this drivetrain elsewhere with a twig clutch gearbox for greater response it means bentley has to use it too they've chewed it pretty hard to try and make it as smooth as they can most of the time it is good it is it is really smooth it's not as responsive as you would expect a twin clutch to be and maybe that's because it's been tuned for more luxury but sometimes you ask for a shift you don't quite get it you don't quite get it straight away this is a big car it occupies a lot of road and it kind of feels it as well and as you go over crests and bumps there is a bit of float there is a bit of you know you do there is this sort of it takes a second to settle as you go over crests and bumps you can whack the suspension thanks to here into a sport mode which really does firm things up on tight twisty rows like this but you're always aware even though this car is lighter than bentley's w12 which has an extra i don't know 100 kilos in the nose maybe you are aware this is a big car it gets it takes some effort to get it turned but that effort is not without reward there is lots of traction there is lots of grip steering's really nice it's very smooth it's very linear it just sort of takes up a little bit of weight and feel just off sort of straight ahead in this kind of very natural feeling way and the balance of uh power front to rear is generally in normal driving pushed well towards the back so as you accelerate out of bends the software starts to put power to the front because it thinks okay you may want a bit of extra traction and stuff like that so this is never a car that feels really rear driven even though most of the time it is it just feels very planted very solid very refined it's certainly at the upper end of the luxury when it comes to luxury gt behavior and that's probably really appropriate for this car bentley is a bentley it's difficult to dislike it for that isn't it really i've have an awful lot of time for this car i like it a great deal but whether it gets that blend of gt luxury sport it certainly sits at the at the luxury end of that scale and whether that's the most likeable thing for a gt well we'll have to try the others and see how they come out [Music] and so to the aston martin db11 whose interior is a bit of a mixed bag let's start with what's good i like the driving position the driving position is strong i don't like the steering wheel but i said i'll just concentrate on the things that i like for the moment driving position is sound it's quite a cocoonish cockpity style interior and i am also quite a fan of having the gear selectors up here i know not everybody is but what it means is it frees up space down here and you can have this arm rest as far back or as far forward as you like which is quite cool leaves this big storage cubby here and leaves room for a controller for the infotainment system right here and most of the materials are pretty good you get this kind of chopped carbon which i'm quite a fan of the stitching is nice the leather is good that's what's good there are some bits that are not quite so hot and primarily they are a two or three generation old mercedes infotainment system which is just really slow i like the fact that it's controlled with a proper controller rather than being all touchscreen but it's just lacking some of the some of the stuff that you would that you would like some of the iphone integration and stuff like that things that you might realistically want it does not have there is also no excuse for the style of plastic in these air vents it's just it's it's not good enough and you may be too young to remember the sinclair zx spectrum of 1982 but i am not and it introduced me to the colors cyan and magenta and they're kind of replicated in these dials here which is really low shonky resolution not as low as a zx spectrum it's maybe commodore 64 quality and that's really poor at this sort of money and it's kind of in it kind of indicates the amount of money that a company like aston had to blow on this sort of thing they are not part of a massive multinational global corporate empire and i think when it comes to some of this stuff it really shows so it's going to have to make up ground on the road so with this interior the aston has got a little bit of work to do to really sort of impress as a gt car and immediately if you come out of the bentley and you see in this you can feel that the ride is less isolated there's more connection with the road that's not necessarily a bad thing if you get more dynamism with it because the gt by its definition of grand tourer has to have a combination of the two sort of luxury and sports together it just depends where you want to sit on that slope as to whether this or the bentley is the the preferable car i feel like i'm talking louder it feels like a noisier car i think there's more wind there's more road noise but there's certainly a greater connection between me and the road beneath me this is strictly rear-wheel drive it drives through a conventional eight-speed auto this is the amr version of the db11 which means there's a 5.2 litre twin-turbocharged v12 rather than the db11 v8 that puts a bit more weight in the nose but this is still a lighter feeling and more agile car than that bentley it's got a really nice blend i think of ride and handling for a gt car really nice blend if you want to change the ride handling balance of things it's one click on here puts it into uh sport mode in on the dampers and then you put them in sport plus does make a difference on a little road like this you can do the same to the powertrain you put it in sport and then sport plus which turns up the engine though and also the exhaust pops i mean they might be a bit contrived but i don't care it does sound mega this engine is a serious piece of kit and when you've got the suspension turned up into a firmer mode as you go over crests and bumps it doesn't sort of take quite so long to settle and it doesn't float quite so much over the top as the bentley does it just gets it all done in a sort of breath and a half rather than two breaths and because this twin turbocharged v12 makes so much torque low down and it's only rear wheel driven just has that ability as you come out of the corner just wants to help it straighten its line in that really nice natural way [Music] that front engine rear wheel drive cars do with a long wheelbase you can just trail the brakes into a corner to keep the weight on the nose and then just as you come back on the power it just pushes it straight that's really lovely that really really lovely balance that i like in a gt car you know the traditional gt car is a long bonneted vehicle very sleek very elegant front engine rear wheel drive with a nice pleasing natural balance and this car is all of those things let's put it back into its gt-ish modes one single pull on this big lever puts the gearbox back into drive and then if you just pull a paddle it puts it into manual and stays there i really like that i don't know why more cars don't don't have that sometimes you have to you know you override it and then it overrides it for a short amount of time and then you have to really yank it this way and that way to put it in manual this is really straightforward and i've i really really like that way of doing things but now it's back in its full gts mode the softest most luxurious modes it has no it is not as isolated no it is not as concerting no it's not as comfortable and it's certainly not as well finished as the bentley but i don't necessarily mind that if you are taking a long motorway drive from here to scotland the bentley would be better this would be quite comfortable the steering's nice and relaxed takes up weights there is a good speed takes on a nice amount of weight as you turn it's very natural this would be fine over a really long distance and then it would be more fun than the bentley when you get to where you're going on that scale of comfort versus dynamism i prefer where this sits and we've said this before i think actually as well i this this feels more like a gt coupe or two to me the bentley is a luxury car this is a grand tourer where the ferrari sits will be an interesting thing to see finally then welcome to the interior of the ferrari aroma which is funky like no ferrari ever before and like neither of the other cars here as well material quality is not up to bentley standards but that is hardly a surprise is it and then things have changed from a ferrari point of view you used to get a big analog rev counter in the middle that is now digital and this entire display is digital and all of the controls that were on the steering wheel in sort of big buttony form have now a lot of them have become these sort of haptic buttons which is mostly fine but i have while cornering hit this one here which changes the view of that display panel entirely but the driving controls such as they are the indicators wipers and headlights remain on the steering wheel and then all of the ancillaries have kind of disappeared onto this touch screen the passenger gets to choose some of them themselves too touch screen is okay it looks a bit weird it feels a little bit plasticky but you at least have somewhere to rest your hand while you're doing it and actually it's not overburdened with functions which is quite cool so i like the style i like the design i like the idea of it what i am intrigued to see is how it all fits together and comes together while you're driving okay so welcome to the inside of the ferrari on the move and i can immediately tell you it's not as flat as either of the other two it's being moved around and this steering is really sharp this is a razor sharp car if you are looking at the gt scale going from luxury through to sports it takes about 50 yards to know so so quick to respond through there it takes about 50 yards to know that this is well up the sports end of the scale how comfortable is it well my seats my seats are not very good you can mess around with them electronically through here and even if you back off the lumbar support and try and beef up the other sides they're kind of flat and unsupportive it's not not really sporty but also not really comfortable gt like but in terms of interior quibbles go i don't have much else having spent a little while in this interior i quite like this this thing i would prefer still i think a big analog rev counter because i just think it looks cooler than this one but this is a really quite functional interior and i've actually got used to this stuff on the steering wheel very quickly it's so razor sharp it's just over two turns between locks and the steering lock is actually quite quite good so it's it's really it's really quick but i think what's just as relevant as the speed of the rack is how quickly it responds to just even the tiniest inputs whereas in the aston and the and the bentley if you as you turn you sort of start to take up a bit of extra weight and a bit of response and it feels quite natural in a way of trying to kid you that you're feeling you know the tyre build up a bit of force as soon as you turn in this it's just looking left and right it's like meerkat head responsive so it feels like you're sitting at the back rather than in the middle and it's turning around you feels a little bit like it's turning in front of you but there's no denying the front-end has got loads of bike loads of response this is i don't know it feels more sports car than gt car there are elements [Music] of sort of front engined 488 or f8 ferrari about it rather than it just being a relaxed grand tourer it is not as relaxing a car to drive and when you find sort of truck grooves or poor surfaces it does sort of tramline a little bit in a way that certainly the bentley doesn't the bentley is more stable but you know it's what you expect isn't it and this drivetrain is terrific it's a it's a twin clutch gearbox but it's massively responsive and yet still very smooth when it's just left to its own devices it's actually pretty good at maneuvering it's not quite as refined and straightforward as the other as the other two cars but you know you get a few more revs revs on as it's just sort of pickles around but it's it's fine it's not a problem but this car really comes to life on rows where there are a lot of corners and a lot of inputs and you've got good visibility and you can press on a bit i suspect it's a really good track car i imagine it's the best track car here because it's so hyper responsive and agile and it weighs less than the other two and because of the way ferrari tunes its engines although this is a twin turbocharged car peak torque doesn't come in until sort of three and a half thousand revs and yeah peak power is it like i don't know just just around just under 6 000 some of that and it revs to the other side of seven but ferrari likes its engines to feel linear it doesn't feel like a hugely turbocharged low boosted car whereas the aston has peak torque from like 1500 revs you kind of have to work this a bit more and i'm okay with that so when it comes to picking a winner i've got two colleagues with me here at the moment i've asked them both which they would have which is the best gt car and which manufacturer did the best job at nailing the brief it set itself because those three questions are not all the same question which one would they have they both said they'd have the ferrari which one is the best grand tourer they both said the bentley and i said well okay which manufacturer do you think did its job at the best when it set up its brief in writing at the start of the project which manufacturer got it best done and they both said ferrari so your finishing order technically by by that very democratic objective set of purposes goes ferrari wins bentley second aston martin third it's not as simple as that with this test because these cars all do a slightly different thing whichever one you want will be the best car for you for me the kind of driving i do a mix of motorway back road i like noises i like a grand tourer that you know you can trail break it i like any car you trail brake in and then get back on the power and it sort of unsettles itself in that long bonnet front engine rear drive gt way so the aston for me is the car that i enjoy the most this is too hyper for me the bentley is too inert and comfortable for me the aston gets it right for where i want the car to be but i am in no doubt it is not the best car here this is the best car here because dynamically it does astonishing things it is really good and it's breathtakingly beautiful and it sounds good and i actually quite like the inside as well and the bentley nails what bentley thinks a luxury car should be it's a bit too soft for some of the gt purposes for me but there's no denying it's a cracking piece of kit but this is i am in no doubt a very sporty gt car and it's the best car here and i think even if you had one of the other two and you were comfortable in your own skin that you bought the right one you'd look at one of these and think maybe i should have maybe i should have and i don't think you'd necessarily get that if you bought this and saw the other two so this car is number one can't we right are we wrong i don't think so seems fairly democratic but if you think otherwise drop a note down in the comments and if you liked this vid we'd really love a like and if you subscribe you won't miss any of our other reviews news motor shows when we get those again group tests will it drifts we're here at least once a week we're also called up code uk all the time in newsagents every wednesday or there is a digital edition of the print magazine which has been published every week since 1895. and cheers for now see you next [Music] time [Music]

Channel: Autocar

Views: 62,234

Rating: 4.921792 out of 5

Keywords: autocar, grand-tourer, ferrari-roma, bentley-continental-gt, aston-martin-db11-amr, bentley-continental, aston-martin-db11, Ferrari Roma vs Bentley Continental GT vs Aston Martin DB11, Ferrari Roma review, Bentley Continental GT V8 review, Aston Martin DB11 AMR review, Roma vs Conti GT vs DB11, new ferrari, Ferrari Roma 2021, new bentley review, new aston martin review

Id: AaWj-0t3xOE

Length: 21min 1sec (1261 seconds)

Published: Thu Jun 17 2021