Bentley Sports Car Concept at Paris 2012

It appears Bentley are planning to reveal a new sports car concept at the 2012 Paris Motor Show, perhaps as a pointer to a new, sportier, model.

Bentley has a great motorsport history, but its current crop of cars – even the new Continental GT Speed – are heavy grand tourers rather than sports cars.

But with Bentley looking for new directions in a bid to up its annual sales to 15,000, they are looking at new directions to build sales, one of which is the Bentley SUV.

But if a report by Car & Driver today is to be believed, then Bently are planning on building more sporty cars with a Bentley Sports Car Concept set to debut at the Paris Motor Show next month to show a possible way forward.

There are no details yet, but this won’t be the first time Bentley has shown a high-performance sports cars in recent years; the Bentley Hunaudières – forerunner to the Bugatti Veyron – was shown at the Geneva Motor Show in 1999.

The Bentley Hunaudières was based on the Lamborghini Diablo’s underpinnings and featured a naturally aspirated 8.0 litre W16 engine with 623bhp and capable of a 4 second sprint to 60mph.

No one is suggesting that Bentley could be about to reveal a challenger to sister company Bugatti’s Veyron, but the Hunaudières proved Bentley still has the ability to produce an extreme car and maybe the 2012 Paris Motor Show will show us where they’re heading?

Let’s hope so.