There's a dangerously overloaded motorised rickshaw veering towards me from my right, a new Audi with red military plates up my backside and a minibus full of tourists heading to Tiananmen Square squeezing into a tiny spot in front of me. I'm a swivel-eyed motoring hack in hot water as I think to myself that Beijing's crowded streets are probably not the best place to test the latest £140 000 (R2.03 million) luxury sedan from Bentley.
The Flying Spur is a 5.3 metre-long limousine with a monstrous six-litre W12 engine (best not to think about its emissions) and, on Beijing's polluted streets, the potential for scraping its beautiful dark cashmere-coloured paint or mangling its five-spoke alloy wheels is high. Thankfully, in China the rules of the road follow the principle that might is right and the Crewe-built Flying Spur isn't short of might.
CORPORATE VANITY
Most car launches I attend are in glamorous locations such as Dagenham or Castle Bromwich, but I'm in Beijing because it turns out the Chinese love the British-built Bentley. It's a bit of a corporate vanity exercise, too, as Bentley reminds its shareholders just how well it is doing with 22 percent growth last year alone, much of that down to China.
In 2012, for example, it sold just 125 Continental Flying Spurs (the car the new Flying Spur replaces) in the UK, but shifted 1164 of the luxury monsters in China.
You have only to look at traffic for five minutes to realise that China is the automotive future - practically every second or third car in central Beijing is a luxury German, American or British model with a well-dressed twentysomething at the wheel.
This obvious inequality (the other cars are battered old trucks and three-wheelers) is one reason the Communist Party is planning to ban luxury-car owners from using red military plates on BMWs, Audis, Bentleys and a whole host of other luxury makes. After all, which local official is going to be brave enough to give a general's car a speeding ticket?
GENUINELY HANDCRAFTED
It is only outside Beijing, in the Chinese countryside, that I can finally take stock without crippling fear of a crash. From the rear seats - where most buyers spend most of their time - the Flying Spur is so smooth and quiet that the entire People's Liberation Army could parade past and you wouldn't hear their jackboots pounding. It feels genuinely handcrafted, too, with acres of hide and a week's work of craftsmanship alone in the three football-pitches' worth of thread-cross-stitched leather. There's even a touch-screen control to alter the temperature and fire up the rear-seat entertainment system. I mean, who wants to drive on these roads when you've got a touch-screen to play with and a two-bottle champagne cooler?
That said, Chinese roads are an infrastructure engineer's dream, both smooth and wide, and it's only the fear of a tuk-tuk coming the wrong way around a blind bend that keeps my speed down when I take the wheel. The Flying Spur is the fastest Bentley sedan yet but can be thrown around with ease despite its vast size and weight. And, if I was a young Chinese princeling who didn't care about the paintwork, I think I'd be quite drawn to it. I even think it's pretty. Now, where do I find a red licence plate? - The Independent
BENTLEY FLYING SPUR
UK Price: £140,900 (R2.04 million).
Engine: Six-litre W12.
Power: 460kW at 6000rpm.
Top speed: 322km/h
0-100km/h: 4.3 seconds.
Fuel consumption: 14.8 litres per 100km.
CO2 emissions: 343g/km.