I don't. I never imagined I'd be here in the first place, and I'll almost certainly never find myself here again. 'How was it?' asks the Bentley PR lady as I pull my crash helmet off. For a moment I struggle to find a word that adequately sums-up the thrill of my scant four laps. Sensational? Of course. Awesome? Chee-sey.

'Fabulous,' I reply. And I mean it in every sense, as I appreciate more fully later, when I check the definition in the dictionary: '1 incredible, exaggerated, absurd. 2 marvellous 3 a celebrated in fable b legendary, mythical.'

Yup, the Le Mans-winning Bentley Speed 8 is all of that, even the last bit since its historic victory in June. The 'absurd' part applies less to the car, more to the very notion that we'd been flown to Circuit Paul Ricard to drive Number 7, the car that was raced to the flag by Tom Kristensen, Dindo Cappello and Guy Smith. Surely a company so acutely aware of its history at this exciting time of re-invention knows that it would be a brave decision even to wash Number 7, let alone give a bunch of journalists the chance to drive it.

Then, 24 hours before my drive, I learn that although it bears the numbers and names, the car I'll be driving isn't actually the winning car or even second-placed Number 8. And to be honest I'm relieved. It hardly diminishes the experience, because there are only three 2003-spec Speed 8s. This is 004/2, which raced at the gruelling Sebring 12-hours and has born the brunt of endurance testing, racking up some 12,000 miles at racing speeds, including a 30-hour pre-Le Mans test here at the Circuit Paul Ricard. Thus it has played a crucial role in the fairytale that has seen Bentley add its sixth Le Mans winner's trophy to the display cabinet at Crewe, after a gap of 73 years.

And it could be a while before they add another, because just a couple of weeks after our drive, Bentley announced it wouldn't be returning in 2004. No real surprise there. First, the Le Mans programme was scheduled to run for three years and reached its conclusion with this year's win.
Second, from a marketing standpoint only an uninterrupted hat-trick would top a solus win, and while that's not unattainable, as Audi has shown, even if Bentley won next year, drastic regulation changes would mean building an all-new, more production-based car for 2005. Finally, perhaps most tellingly, they're letting journos loose in one of the three Speed 8s...

Journos with race experience, mind. I've got some but I feel I've barely scraped in when I see that among the lucky ten invitees assembled in the suite above the pits are Phillip Peter, who won the most recent FIA GT race in a Ferrari 575, and the affable Aguri Suzuki, former F1 driver. No pressure, then.

None at all, says suave, five-times Le Mans winner Derek Bell, consultant to Bentley, in his briefing. Our objective should be to get a flavour of the car, he tells us, not set the fastest lap possible; there will be no lap timing because they want the car back in one piece. Fair enough.

Last night we had dinner with Bell and Kristensen, now also a five-times winner, and in a considerably shorter time-frame. 'Took me 26 years. He's done it from eight starts,' said Bell with mock exasperation. Hoping to get an inside line, I ask him how the Speed 8 compares with the other Le Mans cars he's raced. 'Totally different,' he says. 'In the [Porsche] 962 you'd come into a corner on the brakes, turn and the rear would drift out. Then,' he says, his hands and arms describing twists of imaginary counter-steer, 'you'd pick up the power and apply opposite lock when the rev counter needled flared up.' It always looked to me like the Porsches were guided by Scalextric slots. Seems like the Bentley approaches that feel: 'The Speed 8 is all about entry speed,' advises Bell. 'The downforce keeps the car pinned to the road and you drive it hard for the apex.'

It's a dazzlingly bright day at Paul Ricard, warm but with a sharp breeze. That's the famous Mistral, which Bell advises us may alter the feel of the car considerably if you're leaning on the aerodynamics through the long and awesomely fast 'Signes' corner. Clearly this information is not for the benefit of the less experienced, like me, who might confuse downforce with a TV gardening programme.

Standing barely crotch-high in the pit lane, the dark green Speed 8 is both sinister and beautiful, the sort of creature that might have been discovered way down in the inky fathoms of the sea. It's an amalgam of slippery, globular curves and that vast, squared-rigged rear wing. Feeding that wing with a less turbulent flow of air was among the main objectives of the almost all-new 2003 car, along with more front-end downforce to eliminate the understeer that characterised the earlier EXP (for experimental) Speed 8s. Power steering was added so that the extra front grip could be exploited without wearing out the drivers.

Time is tight so batches of journos pile into sumptuous Arnage Ts driven by Bell and Kristensen for single, sedate 'sighting' laps. The first part is easy - out of the pits, under the bridge to turns one and two (L'ecole), a 90-deg-plus right followed quickly by a less-than-90-deg right that connects to a half-mile of the wide Mistral straight. At the brake marker boards, the jovial Kristensen announces: 'You'll be doing 295kmh (183mph) in sixth here.'

Just over the crest, apex unsighted, lurks the butt-puckering Signes right-hander. 'I take fifth but the back can get loose. If you're in fourth and you misjudge it you go straight on, no problem. In fifth you spin into the wall. I suggest fourth.' Going straight on at Paul Ricard isn't a problem because there are no tall curbs and no gravel traps, just lots more asphalt banded with brightly coloured, arresting strips of high-grip surfacing. The conclusion of the lap is all rather technical, starting with a double-apex right-hander, Beausset. Trouble is, it's featureless as well as being technical, and the view from the Speed 8 is going to be less good than from the Arnage.

Getting into the Speed 8's cockpit requires a high degree of physical flexibility even if you're not much larger than a jockey, placing hands and feet on non-vulnerable parts of the wide sill area before wriggling your legs under the wheel and over the anti-submarining hump of the seat. At Le Mans the driver change time was expected to be a factor in the race with the open-cockpit Audi R8s. As it transpired, the fastest R8 took itself out of the equation when Frank Biela missed the pit entrance and ran out of fuel.

It's snug and a little claustrophobic inside the narrow bubble cockpit. A fat carbonfibre hoop reassuringly encircles the cabin from screen header to floor, while ahead is a small squared-off wheel with metallic paddles, and a small Bosch electronic dashboard. Much of the upper portion of the turret-like, curved windscreen is blanked off but the pill-box view matches that of my crash helmet aperture so visibility is fine. Even so, as Bell explained the previous evening, most drivers prefer open Le Mans cars despite the wind buffeting: 'You get very hot and sweaty in a closed car and when it rains water finds its way in, so at the end of a stint you're wringing wet. And the windows steam up. Still, when you're upside down at 180mph you appreciate having a roof.'

The 'pre-flight' with Bell ignores the impressive array of dashboard twist switches (which the drivers use during the race to adjust vitals such as fuel mapping), and most of the steering wheel buttons, too. I'm shown how to find neutral, how to re-start in case of a spin, and told that the right-hand paddle is for upshifts, the left for downshifts, and that's about it. 'When you floor it in second you might feel the tail do this,' says a smiling Bell, miming a twist of opposite lock. 'Have fun.'

The door is pressed shut and secured. A mechanic circles his index finger, I press the little green starter button and there's a hollow, metallic ring as the starter motor engages and churns. The 4-litre, twin-turbo V8 catches and assumes a fast-ish idle, its note blustery and tight-lipped, indicating it's a flat-plane-crank design like a Ferrari 360's rather than a thundering trad V8.

I pull back on the right paddle and there's a clattery clonk as chunky straight-cut Xtrac gears mesh like the two halves of a rugby scrum. Thankfully, the massively heavy clutch is only needed to get rolling. After one stall - ker-chunk then silence broken only by the accusing whine of fuel pumps - we're away.

It feels superb: fabulously low-slung but well- sighted, firm but not harsh, and genuinely comfortable. I tug back for second early and then press the throttle halfway. WOAH! A smooth, hefty slug of power shoves the Speed 8 forward and it skims down the track, attitude to the road unchanged.

Into the first right-hander and I'm enjoying it even more. The tiny steering wheel turns easily and the nose darts positively for the apex. The Speed 8 is alert but not nervous, its steering light but with a surprising amount of feel, though the clearest message coming through is 'loads more grip, mate'. Once we're pointing straight up the Mistral, I push the throttle to the floor, the rear tyres stay firmly hooked up and the full effect of 600bhp in just 900kg hits home. It's a solid, peak-free delivery, the slam in the back staying the same right through the rev-range. And pretty much right through the first four gears too, the 0.1sec upshifts giving it a virtually seamless feel. This is the thump of any supercar you care to name, plus a bit.

I back off early at the end of the straight, drop a gear, and power tentatively through Signes. As soon as I can see the apex, I realise I've been massively conservative. I up my commitment for the double-apex Beausset, get into the first part nicely, downshift and - oh my God - I miss the second apex by a mile and run wide off the track. It's an embarrassing mistake that goes unpunished thanks to that unique run-off, but a honking great wake-up call for me. What did I do wrong?

I feel my way around the rest of the curves quite happily, thread through the tight right that leads onto the pit straight and floor it. For the first time I notice the shift lights embedded in the top edge of the instrument binnacle and realise I've not yet taken the engine to the redline. I've soon rectified that and I'm up to fifth and around 150mph by the time the countdown boards are looming for turn one. I brake early to see what's in reserve, carbon bites carbon and if I hadn't eased off I'd have been at turn-in speed at about the 100m board. Phenomenal. As with the steering, the surprise is that there's plenty of feel. And the downshifts are superb - crisp and smooth.

I get on the throttle earlier onto the straight and the tail steps out a fraction but correction is a doddle. When I reach the braking area for Signes I'm in sixth, which feels like an overdrive as the revs drop noticeably. Fourth again through Signes but carrying more speed and then I'm lined up again for the Beausset.

First clipping point, downshift, fine. Now turn again, look for the second apex and - cripes! - I have to steer much harder or I'm going straight on again. The car digs for grip, I feel the g-force build massively but we're round.

It occurs to me that I've just glimpsed the true capability of the Speed 8. I've also discovered that I might be having fun but to pedal one of these really quickly I'd have to get seriously fit - I'm almost dizzy after that 180-deg-plus turn, partly because my duff line has turned into a closing spiral of ever-increasing g-force.

As I tack through the late-apex corners and long fourth-gear curve back to the pit straight again, it dawns on me that although I've inadvertently experienced the Speed 8's potential, in the hands of a professional driver it must be close to that limit in every corner. Obvious, really.

By the time my laps are over, I'm deeply impressed by the Speed 8's sheer driveability, but I need to see what it can really do, feel the pace it was designed to carry through the downforce corners. I need to but I'm also bricking it a bit. And with good reason, it transpires.

Bentley has brought along a hybrid 2001/02 EXP Speed 8 with two seats and, after a suitably long stewing period, I'm strapped into it alongside Bell for a couple of laps at qualifying pace. I've seen Bell's driving in the excellent Duke video In Car 956 (if you haven't, get a copy and I swear you'll watch open-mouthed) and also seen the eyes of fellow journos easing themselves out after their laps with him. I have no doubt that the 61-year-old is going to demonstrate the full potential of the Speed 8.

This engine seems coarser but it's just as powerful and the EXP Speed 8 feels as brutally fast. The gearing is a little shorter low down and longer high up, so for Signes Bell takes fourth, and a huge amount more speed. At Beausset, my bogey corner, I think he's got it all wrong. We seem to be carrying massively too much speed and turning in far too sharply, but no - the Speed 8 hangs on like a huge arm has hooked around a lamppost. Bell then actually accelerates mid-corner before braking and turning even harder into the second apex. My head is reeling from the loadings and I've only just recovered before we're into the next, slower turn, Bell muscling the wheel over. This is a hot lap but the second, when the old slicks are warmer, is even faster in the fastest parts. And the braking - at the end of the pit straight it feels like he doesn't hit the pedal until we're upon the 100m board. Incredible.

Two laps of this, with a tang of petrol in the cockpit, is enough for me. Incredibly, at Le Mans this year Kristensen did a stint of almost three-and-a-half hours - twice Grand Prix distance - lapping close to his qualifying time.

My appreciation of the Speed 8's ability has been well and truly cemented. The physical effort required to drive it is no more than that required to drive a supercar like the Zonda or Enzo. You can easily exploit all of the Bentley's straight-line performance and enjoy pushing it in the first and second gear corners, feeling the grip through the wheel and the seat of your pants. In short, the Speed 8 is wonderfully driveable like a modern supercar. But it's a supercar with serious downforce that takes it to another, mind-blowing level. Fabulous is the only word to describe it.