VOLUME 57 ISSUE 40 OCTOBER 6, 2020 P77
M
otorcycle racing is a funny old
game. It's a revolving door of the
same players, each enjoying their
sometimes-brief turn in the limelight before
being booted out by another old player
with new technology, or new model.
A look at the recent history of
WorldSBK does not read well for the
biggest manufacturer in the world.
Honda's last WorldSBK race win came
thanks to the late Nicky Hayden at
Malaysia in 2016—multiple lifetimes ago if
you're as used to winning as Honda.
That cannot stand for Honda, and now
we've seen the WorldSBK team move in
house at HRC with new riders and an all-
new motorcycle in the very long-winded
name of the CBR1000RR-R Fireblade SP.
As seems to be the case for pretty
much every motorcycle these days,
the new Honda superbike landed
in almost every other country and
districts around the world before it got
here. But it's here now, so fans of the
Big H can finally rejoice. It seems they
already have done so, as Honda tells
us a large portion of the first batch of
deliveries were pre-sold to guys and
girls across the country.
Unlike the 2017/'18/'19'/20
CBR1000RR and CBR1000RR SP,
this RR-R Fireblade SP is a ground-up
remodel. The 2020 model owed much
of its being to the 2008 CBR1000RR,
a bike that received gradual
improvements over its life but was, at its
core, essentially the same thing.
If you want to just know what the
new bike is like to ride, head to the ride
section of this test.
M O D E
A C T I VAT E D
BY RENNIE SCAYSBROOK
PHOTOGRAPHY BY DREW RUIZ, VIDEO BY JORDAN POWELL
