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Infiniti Q80 Inspiration imagines future of brand's luxury flagship

Infiniti is among the best of the non-exotic brands when it comes to crafting concepts, with designers who just seem to know how to show a truly wild vehicle with subtle hints at a future model. Just take a look at its latest Q80 Inspiration at the 2014 Paris Motor Show to see what we mean.
Infiniti claims that the Q80 imagines how it would build a future, fullsize luxury sedan to take on the stalwart Mercedes-Benz S-Class. However, in the current form it seems like a flight of fancy. It's packed with fabulously weird styling tricks, including birdwing-shaped headlights. There's also the roof and windshield that look at first glance to be a single piece of teardrop-shaped glass terminating at a boat-tail rear. In addition, the Inspiration has every concept designer's favorite gimmick - suicide doors.
Under the hood sits a twin-turbocharged 3.0-liter V6 and electric motor hybrid with a claimed 550 horsepower. The company asserts that the powertrain is actually on the way in the next two years and could do 43 miles per gallon (5.5 liters per 100 kilometers), though it's not specified on what driving cycle that's calculated on.

Assessing Sebastian Vettel's first 100 days as Infiniti's director of performance

Whenever a new US president is elected, we know to expect a performance review as soon as he (or she) has spent 100 days in office. Sebastian Vettel, arguably given a job that is more important to Infiniti than the US president, has been the brand's director of performance for one hundred revolutions of The Blue Marble, and Infiniti has put together a videographic glimpse of his work at Paul Ricard, in the US and England.
We probably won't really get a grip on the full results of his efforts for a while - we doubt that he's been in his post long enough to significantly alter the trajectory of the Q50 sedan, for instance. But then again, Infiniti insists he's been integral to the car's dynamics development regime, suggesting he's been working as a test driver for some time before these 100 days. Of course, Vettel is a race car driver and brand ambassador first and foremost, but when he tells a Q50 engineer that "For the future, I think it's more comfortable to have the shift paddles on the steering wheel," we get the sense that he won't hesitate to suggest changes in forthcoming products. Check out more of his inputs in the video below as well as a press release detailing his visit to the tech center in Cranfield, UK.

Race Recap: Singapore Grand Prix is about a safety car and submission

The Singapore Formula One Grand Prix is the Monaco GP of the Orient - a weekend known more for its glamour and time-slot than on-track action, with a temporary circuit that punishes every mistake, usually terminally.
Lewis Hamilton in the Mercedes-AMG Petronas got the best of Free Practice 1, opening the curtain on a possible resurgence of Silver Arrows performance. By the time qualifying was done, though, it was his teammate Nico Rosberg who lined up second on the grid, followed by Romain Grosjean with a beautiful performance in the Lotus, Mark Webber in the Infiniti Red Bull, and Hamilton all the way back in fifth. Behind them were Felipe Massa outqualifying Ferrari teammate Fernando Alonso, Jenson Button getting the McLaren into eighth, Daniel Ricciardo with another good Q3 effort to get into ninth, and the shocker of Esteban Gutiérrez getting his Sauber into the top ten for the first time this year.
At the front of the pack was Sebastian Vettel. Again. But he was only ahead of Rosberg by a single tenth of a second...