(FORTUNE Magazine) – Three years ago Rolls-Royce introduced a turbocharged Bentley to pay homage to the car's roots as a 1920s racer. As befits a marque famous for understatement and preferred by Lord Peter Wimsey, initial response was polite: 292 were sold worldwide. The next year sales vroomed to 380. In September, Rolls, whose sales have been flat, introduced a still meaner Bentley, which at zero to 60 in 6.7 seconds can claim to be among the quickest four-door production cars on earth. Expected world sales by year's end: more than 600, with 135 of the cars going to North America. Not bad growth for a product that commands $145,000 a pop. Credit Peter Ward, 43, Rolls's chief executive officer, for figuring that the Bentley would get the company into a younger and sportier segment of the market. ''While Rolls-Royce and aggression were not exactly happy partners,'' he says, ''Bentley, with its racing heritage, was.'' Who's buying? ''The customer is almost certain to be a male, in his 40s to very early 50s,'' says Ward. ''He's a product of the Sixties -- Beach Boys music and foreign sports cars.'' The sports cars are small for him now, but he wants power. Not everyone agrees. Says one youthful Rolls buyer, a New York lawyer: ''I never considered a Bentley. I want everybody in the world to see that at 35 years old I can buy a new Rolls-Royce.'' Speed doesn't impress him. ''You , never have to accelerate quickly in a Rolls -- you're already there.''