2005 Infiniti
Q45
 By  Mitch McCullough
 $62,420

Regal 3350
Story by Roy Attaway
Photos by Robert Holland
$157,240

New features, fresh styling ..... The Infiniti Q45 features new styling and more luxury equipment for 2005. It looks more aggressive than before, with new front and rear fascia, a restyled hood and grille, a new headlight design with integrated fog lights, a restyled rear deck, new LED tail lights, and new chrome trim.

Everything about the Q45 is smooth and easy. It's balanced well for driving on twisting roads and it's very stable at high speeds. Yet the ride is smooth, even on bumpy roads. Its powerful V8 engine delivers excellent performance and makes a wonderful growl. The Q45 uses rear-wheel drive, like a BMW or Mercedes-Benz, for better handling. The five-speed automatic transmission has been re-calibrated on 2005 models for smoother acceleration and more responsive downshifts. The active damping suspension, previously optional, is standard on all 2005 models.

Infiniti may not have the heritage of BMW or Mercedes, but it offers first-class appointments and craftsmanship. A DVD-based navigation system is now standard. A new system tightens the seatbelts during emergency braking, helping to optimize the position of the driver for emergency maneuvers and crash protection.

Model Lineup

The Infiniti Q45 is a rear-wheel-drive sedan powered by a 4.5-liter twin-cam V8. This all-aluminum engine produces a very healthy 340 horsepower and 333 pound-feet of torque. The only available transmission is a five-speed automatic with a manual shift mode.

Regal’s bold and brawny 3350 stirs a commotion with its slick lines and sweet performance. . This boat, the new Regal 3350, makes no pretensions. It is a cruising boat, a party boat, a pleasure barge. It is also very peppy, very agile and, during my test ride, just a little wet. But, then, regarding that last, the day we—Dan Stenger, Regal’s test skipper, and I—gave her a run for her money, the wind was honking out of the northeast like a runaway 18-wheeler on the West Virginia Turnpike. Even as we put her nose out of the inlet leading from the Atlantic into Duck Key and Hawk’s Cay Resort in the Lower Florida Keys, the usually aquamarine water was churned to the color of milky glacier melt. One dip into a head sea and I was hanging onto the grabrail in the companion seat and praying for my foul-weather gear.

We earnestly tried to run her, tried to get her up to top speed, but it was another classic case of the boat being able to handle more than its passengers could. Only a couple of yahoos hell-bent on proving their manhood would attempt to run at wide-open throttle in a small craft advisory. So, after driving her around in the slop for half an hour, we managed to get her up to 3600 rpm and a speed of 36.2 mph with a pair of 320-hp Volvo Penta sterndrives under the hatch. But we stopped there, even though the builder has recorded a top-end speed of 52.8 mph with the same power in good conditions. Neptune was clearly annoyed and spat his vengeance on us at every turn. Pity. It would have been fun to take this very sexy little boat down to KeyWest and let the babes drool. Over the boat, that is.