In the pantheon of ridiculous publicity stunts, it may rate among the greatest. Lewis Hamilton was required to take on the role of the Greek God Apollo in the sacking of Troy in one of the sport’s more bizarre moments.

Hamilton, 23, who is in Istanbul preparing for this weekend’s Turkish Grand Prix, found himself “flying” on to a stage on which a mock battle for Troy was being fought as part of a promotion for the mobile phone group Vodafone.

The company, which is spending £300 million over five years in support of Hamilton’s Formula One team, McLaren Mercedes, is also one of the sponsors of Fire of Anatolia, a block-buster stage show drawing sell-out crowds in Istanbul, which depicts the battle for Troy and features the famous wooden horse.

Like all Formula One drivers, Hamilton, who is earning an estimated £75 million over the next five years, has to fulfil commitments for his team’s sponsors before races. But after his involvement in this attempt to combine two disparate elements of Vodafone’s worldwide sponsorhip portfolio, he and his father, Anthony, who manages him, may want to think again about what he should and should not consent to do.

Although Hamilton, as is his way, entered into the spirit of the occasion with some enthusiasm, it was embarrassing to watch him as he descended slowly to the stage on a trapeze wire symbolically to bring peace to the warring Greek and Trojan warriors and then fly off again. Dressed in his logoed race driving suit, he looked less like a majestic Apollo than a cross between Peter Pan and an astronaut.

After the “performance” Hamilton anxiously inquired whether or not he had looked “weird” and he seemed a little hurt when he received a resoundingly positive answer. But he argued that this had been within the bounds of what he should be doing, notwithstanding that it would be hard to imagine stars such as David Beckham or Tiger Woods agreeing to such a stunt.

“For sure if I had to wear some strange Borat crazy suit, I wouldn’t be doing that,” he said in a reference to Sacha Baron Cohen's comedy character from Kazakhstan. “There are limits to what you do, but it’s the job I have and I don’t feel I have to do anything stupid.”

Having had only a short rehearsal, Hamilton seemed nervous as he waited for his cue with trumpets blaring, drums rolling and sword fights on the stage below him. “I was just trying to get myself into the acting zone,” he explained afterwards. “I was thinking ‘I am a God flying in’ and how the hell does that look?’.”

Acting, apparently, is on a long list of pursuits the McLaren star would like to try when his racing days in Formula One are over.

“I’d like to try other sports. I’d like to try rallying one day. I’d love to try MotoGP [motorbike racing], Le Mans all those sorts of thing. But also acting and music,” he said.

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