What do we have here then?

It's a Q50 Eau Rouge, named after the famous turn at Spa. The trail goes like this: Red Bull Racing use Renault engines. Renault is shacked up with Nissan. Nissan owns Infiniti, which therefore gets to glue its stickers on Vettel's racing car. And as part of the deal, they get to use his name on a road car.

So it's a lean, featherweight racing homage, then?

Absolutely not. It might be slathered in real carbon fibre, but this is still a large, luxo sedan. The brochure tries to convince us it's the ‘perfect sports car', which is blatant nonsense. It weighs nearly two tonnes.

Tell us more about this carbon fibre.

It's the real deal: hand made and baked in a small autoclave, like it would be in an F1 factory. Many hours go into each bit, and the rear wing costs £4,800 on its own. Infiniti asked Infiniti Red Bull Racing to shape it, which is why the front wing looks like the wavy one from his racecar and the rear diffuser incorporates a central F1-style foglight.

Sounds expensive.

A regular Q50S AWD costs $43,350. This one is $85,000 and that's before you add the rear wing. The material cost of the carbon takes care of some of the premium (it's all over the wing mirror and interior console too). There's also a new exhaust worth an extra 30bhp and many decibels, plus new and slightly lighter wheels. The seats are re-trimmed in Alcantara with purple stitching and super-Seb badges. Every buyer gets an iPad so they can track the build process of their car. And Infiniti will throw in an unspecified but hopefully excellent experience, depending on dates and availability. Early buyers got a few laps of a circuit with Mr Vettel himself.

So what's it like to drive?

Brutish. The engine is the same as in the Nissan GT-R. The 3.8-litre engine boots put 550bhp, versus the 328bhp in the normal car, and the new exhaust batters the air like a distant Chinook. It's 20mm lower and a bit stiffer than usual, so there's marginally less slop through corners. The carbon bits are actually functional, so there's five per cent less drag and 30 per cent less lift. But you'd have to be going massively fast to notice it, because mostly, this still feels like a monster. It's more agile than an E-class, but doesn't feel as sharp as a BMW M5. And it's wide: on the narrow cols above Monaco, we were permanently paranoid about grating all that lovely carbon on an Alp.

Hmm. But what if I really, really like Mr Vettel?

Then this is the car for you, you big show-off. So move fast before they sell out: only 150 will be made, 50 of which will come to Europe with 15-ish of those for Britain. Oh, and Mr Vettel will get the first one. It's an impressive thing to look at, and anyone with a passing interest in cars will enjoy the noise and spectacle of it all. Otherwise, it's hard to take it seriously. Especially at that price...

The numbers: 3799cc V6 Twin-Turbo, 4WD, 550bhp, 470lb ft, 21.6mpg (combined), 307g/km C02, 0-62mph in 3.1 seconds, 155mph max

The cost: $85,000

The verdict: It's loud and amusing, but a bit of carbon fibre dressing does not transform this into a sports car. It might be named after an F1 champ, but it's a world away from his Sunday wheels. 5/10

The rival: BMW M5, Mercedes E63 AMG S

Q. And what about that high performance model you mentioned?
A. I thought you might ask about that. We have an all-new engine in the pipeline that will only be built in Japan, as it requires specialized production methods only available here. It is a totally new 3.7-liter direct injection, twin-turbocharged V-6 that is being built for our new IPL (Infiniti Performance Line) range of high-performance vehicles. Targeting the likes of the C63 AMG and M3, it will generate upwards of 530 hp.

Q. Finally some real performance from Infiniti. And where will it be built?
A. It'll only be built at the same plant as the Nissan GT-R, our Tochigi plant. I think our marketing types want to create a special high performance "Tochigi brand," as this will be the only place where the GT-R and IPL engines are basically hand-made. Tochigi will come to mean "a unique brand of Japan-made performance, luxury and quality."

Q. What about pricing? Won't this IPL be expensive?
A. The 530-hp IPL-spec G will probably be priced at around the same price as the GT-R if not a fraction more. Given that the basic C63 AMG costs (in Japan) around 10 million yen, that is where the IPL will be priced, I feel.

Read more: Infiniti Super G with 530-hp Twin-Turbo V-6 in Pipeline - Motor Trend