I am not involved in quantum computing at all, and only have read a few articles, but my understanding is:

Calling it a speed up is kinda correct but seems slightly wrong to me. It is a completely different computing model which tends to use different algorithms that make solutions to certain problems feasible on a quantum computer that aren't on an equally powered classical computer. That is why it's so powerful, but at the same time, classical computing could stay "faster" than quantum computing for a long time, or even forever.