Amidst shaky economic times, growing demand still drives the top end of the global luxury auto market. David Cope was there when Bentley launched their latest, the Continental GT V8.

The wines of Rioja are distinct in character. Made predominately from the Tempranillo grape, often blended with a smattering of indigenous Spanish varieties, they're robust and heavy, needing a few years to soften up and find balance. The best examples are not 'new world' in any way, but a classic European style made to be enjoyed after an appropriate amount of time in a cellar. When young, their tannins obscure the fruit, but aged correctly, they're a rich yet supple red wine.

After a decade they've reached a lovely maturity, which explains why the bottles of Marques de Riscal Rioja Reserva 2001 we drank emptied so fast on that first night in Spain. Yet even after this amount of ageing, the wine is for the refined palate. It's no cult garagiste wine or flashy over-extracted trophy-winner, but it's undoubtedly as good as any of these. It's a wine that doesn't need medals or famous awards to attract buyers, since anyone with a palate that understands quality will appreciate its understated appeal.

The wine market is a saturated one and many middle- to high-priced wines have suffered in the recession. The global motor vehicle market has had plenty of suffering too, but at the top luxury end, demand is still there. The team at Bentley are all too aware of this, with a sales growth of almost 40% in 2011, and the launch of the new Continental GT V8 in Spain aims to continue this upsurge.

They also know how to host a media event as luxurious as their cars and the launch was no exception. We stayed at the very grand Hotel Marques de Riscal. Designed by Frank Gehry, the hotel carries his trademark architectural style, which for many means buildings that have zero commonality with their surrounding location. In this case the hotel has an exuberant roof feature of wavy gold and purple titanium panels, which from a distance looks as if a spaceship has crashed into the low vine-covered hills of the Rioja wine region. Very Gehry, indeed.

The building is undeniably striking, as was the freezing cold when I walked outside reception that next morning. Waiting for me was Janice Hinson, my co-driver and PR employee of Bentley UK, who took one look at me and nervously asked if I was okay to drive. Based on how the previous Rioja-filled night, this was a fairly decent question. Walking to the wrong side of the car probably didn't do much for her confidence. “Ah, left-hand drive, yes.” And so it was that my first drive in this behemoth sports car was conducted under a substantial hangover. Thankfully there's nothing like subzero temperatures, snow and driving a powerful sports car on unfamiliar twisting roads in a foreign country to rapidly wake you up.

And then there's the sound of a roaring V8 engine. The all new Bentley Continental GT V8 is quite different to the powerful yet audibly muted twin-turbo W12 engine that goes in the original Continental GT. This is a loud, growling beast of a V8. It screams of muscle car. What this means is that the hair on your arms will stand up when you put your foot flat and the engine delivers a deep, guttural growl. It whizzes through an 8-speed gearbox: just after 4 seconds you're doing 100km/h; another few seconds and you're cracking past 200km/h, the engine still tirelessly delivering that throaty soundtrack. 'Exhilarating' is an understatement.

That morning saw a collection of journalists from around the world driving various versions of the new GT and GTC (convertible) V8 through the postcard Rioja landscape, passing wineries and medieval-looking villages on hilltops where locals stopped in the falling snow to give our power procession a deserved wide-eyed stare. As a South African it was amusing yet sadly familiar to hear the tale of one fellow Bentley driver who was stopped along they way by an opportunistic Spanish Guardia Civil policeman and guided to the nearest ATM to pay a miscellaneous spot-fine of 100euros.

Thankfully this was an isolated incident and the only reported moment of ill fate that day. The snow disappeared and clouds gradually lifted through the morning, so by the time we'd hurled the cars around the countryside for another few hours and safely reached the Circuit de Navarra race track, the skies were clear and track dry.

Wherever you drive this car on the road or on a racing circuit, you're not going to need the sound system since nothing would compare to that V8 soundtrack. The Bentley engineers back in Crewe, England, should get Grammy nominations. The noise makes you smile. It makes you laugh. It makes you drive like a teenage go-karter, foot flat with a silly grin on your face. At one point someone referred to it as a “Ferrari with the engine on the wrong side.” But it's so much more. It's a 2-tonne raging Ferrari-eater. It would have your Aston Martin for a quick snack, chew through a Maserati amuse bouche then munch on your Porsche middle-course before the main meal. All the while, keeping polite English manners.

Pure driving thrill isn't the only thing it delivers though. Bentley spent a lot of time engineering an engine that delivers the expected Bentley performance and torque, but with unbelievable efficiency. An imperceptible variable displacement system deactivates four cylinders when the car is driven at light throttle, drastically dropping fuel consumption and emissions. Between this, lighter engine weight and a few other tricks, the V8 is 40% more fuel efficient than its big W12-engined brother, an achievement the engineers are notably proud of. A full tank gives the driver a range of over 800 kilometres. But let's be honest, none of this will matter to you when you're behind the wheel, since efficiency be damned, you're going to want to drive the absolute hell out of this car.

Driving around the Circuit de Navarra at 250km/h, the Bentley flies around corners and its weight isn't really noticeable. It might have been the after-effects of the previous night's Rioja or just the fact that I'm no Lewis Hamilton, but I wasn't really doing the car or the track enough justice though. A swift change and I was seated next to professional racer and Bentley test driver Jamie Morrow, who at the wheel and with the traction control disabled, aptly demonstrated why the 40:60 front-to-rear power distribution works so well for the Continental GT V8. But even with him really going for it, the muscular tail of the Bentley whipping around corners, tyres screaming and rubber burning, just a deft touch of the accelerator and the rear wheels would gain traction, flinging it straight in an instant. Even at it's limits it still somehow maintains the effortless civility you'd expect of a Bentley.

That evening after a leisurely drive to the hotel in an enormous Bentley Mulsanne, something of a plush land yacht when compared with the car we flung around the track earlier, we were treated to a winetasting. Aside from demonstrating that the unwooded Verdelho white wine from the Rueda region is delicate and fruity, with a fresh finish, the enthusiastic young host showed that by using a fiery hot clamp and a slight touch of cold water you can open a wine bottle by popping the entire neck off.

A bit of showing off to impress the guests, and they enjoyed it. It also helped me realize something: young people make a fortune and go out to buy a Ferrari, not a Bentley. They want a car not just for themselves, but also for the enjoyment of being seen driving it. Like the wine opening trick, it's a bit of showing off. A Bentley is a far more understated luxury, like that aged Rioja we drank the night before. When people buy one it's for their own enjoyment, since while they're as luxurious as cars get, they're somehow not flashy.

The Continental GT V8 is designed to be as exhilarating a drive as the Maserati Granturismo or Ferrari 599 GTB, but the cache and air of superiority that the Bentley badge brings isn't necessarily what everybody wants. My guess is that while the new Continental GT V8 will appeal to a broader market than would previously consider a Bentley, it will still be an older more refined market. But those wealthy individuals who are after the ultimate in luxury and sophistication, can for the first time also have a loud and aggressive sports car at the same time.

Bentley Continental GT V8

Engine: 4-litre twin-turbo V8

Power: 373kw at 6000 rev/min

Transmission: close-ratio 8-speed automatic

Acceleration: 0-100km/h in 4.8 secs

Top speed: 303km/h

Price: 123,850 GBP