This year, at the 2025 Le Mans Classic, a Bentley Motors works team raced at the Circuit de la Sarthe with factory manufactured 4.5 litre cars fitted with an Amherst Villiers supercharger – otherwise known as the “Blower Bentley”. The same cars that were developed by Sir Henry “Tiger Tim” Birkin back in 1930 are now made, prepared, and raced under the “Winged B” banner. This year’s team was also a vindication of the modern Continuation series and the possibilities that now lie ahead for collectors.
To celebrate the event, the owners gathered in London, at Mount Street Gardens, to recreate an iconic photograph taken in 1929 with all the Le Mans winning Bentleys and drivers at that time.
From the left: Le Mans victors. Cars: Bentley 3 Litres from 1924; 1927’s “Witch” – sister car to “Bitch”, the winning 4½ Litre from 1928, and the 1929 Speed Six. Drivers: the original Bentley Boys: Frank Clement, Sammy Davis, Dudley Benjafield, Bernard Rubin, Woolf Barnato and Tim Birkin.
The Continuation cars were started in 2019 with Birkin’s blower Bentley, registration UU5872, being disassembled, all parts CAD scanned, and fabricated in the same manner, to create a limited series of 12 vehicles where collectors could determine colour and interior. Likewise, for the Speed Six, original drawings, supplemented with mechanic’s notes, along with Bentley Heritage Collection’s 1930 example was used.
Much like the original Bentley Boys, acquiring one of the Continuation series allows the current owner into an exclusive club. As with the works race teams of yesteryear, the Continuation series quartet, three blower Bentleys and one Speed Six, were backed by Bentley Mulliner, with dedicated engineers and mechanics, comprising the largest works team since 1930.
Stuart Morley, in the lead Continuation Blower Bentley, waits to start at a rain soaked Le Mans Classic 2025.
Racing the Continuation series at Le Mans is pure “Boys Own” stuff, a chance to return to Birkin’s beloved Circuit de la Sarthe, with the cars he had always envisaged would lead to the resurgence of British motor racing and maintain Bentley’s dominance. The only problem was that, the cars he believed in, run by W.O. Bentley, did not return the favour. W.O. thought the supercharger was a perversion of the true engineering of the Bentley car. Hence, with funding from Dorothy Paget, Birkin developed the supercharger with Amherst Villiers for his own race team. Until the Continuation series, the Bentley manufactured supercharged 4.5 litre was not made or raced under the works banner.
Mike Dacre in the blower Bentley Continuation series racing past the fairground at the Le Mans Classic 2025.
In the face of almost certain defeat at the 1930 Le Mans, where the works Speed Six Bentleys would race against the might of Rudi Caracciola supercharged Mercedes SSK, a pact was made with Birkin and W.O. The blower Bentley would act as the hare for Caracciola to chase, overexerting the Mercedes supercharged engine, and allowing the works Bentley team to drive through to victory. The plan worked.
The win by Barnato and Kidston was thanks to Birkin’s racing for England and putting the chance of personal glory aside. It helped ingrain “Tiger Tim” into the national consciousness. The battle between the supercharged Bentley and the Mercedes SSK became legendary. Ian Fleming was sufficiently inspired by the heroics that he included the chase as a car duel between Drax and Bond in Moonraker.
Bentley v Mercedes – 1930 Le Mans, a print after Bryan De Grineau, from original artwork for The Motor magazine. © Bonhams.
The 2025 works team contested “Grid 1: 1923-1939”, at the Le Mans Classic, 5-6 July, where the racing took place over 24 hours, both day and night, in different segments. Race conditions changed from sweltering heat to torrential downpours making racing conditions challenging to say the least. The 2025 works team did not perhaps fare as well as Birkin would have prayed for. Out of the four cars, Stuart Morely was the first of the Continuation cars to finish, and he placed eighth overall. Two others finished, Mark Manton in the Speed Six and Mike Dacre in the blower Bentley, who ended up 16th and 17th respectively. The final supercharged factory car did not finish.
Mike Dacre summed up the race “It was a truly epic weekend, in extreme weather changes, the car didn’t miss a beat, and the team were incredible, in one of the most wonderfully chaotic and evocative of environments. To bring three of the four cars home in very respectable style was a massive achievement for all involved.” This will surely be the start of the blower Bentley’s renewed love affair with Le Mans.
Author: Andrew Hildreth
Lead image: Bentley Continuation Series racing team 2025.
If you are interested in the history of Bentley, you may enjoy reading Bentley at one hundred: Accelerating forward, Bentley R-Type Continental – JAS 949, and Bentley 1927 3L Le Mans team car “Bitch”.
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