VOLUME 58 ISSUE 31 AUGUST 3, 2021 P125
based on its revolutionary CB750
street bike. Yet deep inside the
company, a group of engineers,
headed by legendary designer
Shoichiro Irimajiri, were quietly
plotting a GP return with a four-
stroke motorcycle.
Honda wanted to return to
racing in a big way, and in 1977
it announced that it would return
to Grand Prix competition—not
with a conventional two-stroke
racer, but with a revolutionary
oval-piston, four-stroke machine
that would showcase Honda's
enormous engineering and R&D
capability.
Honda's insistence on tak-
ing a chance that it could ad-
vance four-stroke technology
far enough to contend with the
inherently superior two-stroke de-
sign was a case of sticking with
the horse that got them to the
rodeo. After all, Honda had made
its reputation and fortune on
revolutionary street bikes such
as the groundbreaking CB750.
Unlike the other three Japa-
nese manufacturers, Honda's
road lineup consisted primarily
of four-stroke-powered bikes.
Why should it turn away from its
bread and butter? In addition, if
the NR were successful, it would
prove Honda's utter engineering
domination.
Honda campaigned the NR
with disastrous results in 1979
and 1980. In its debut at the
British Grand Prix at Silverstone
in August of 1979, neither bike
qualified. NR riders Mick Grant
and Takazumi Katayama had to
be given promoter entries into
the race—and neither finished.
The NR had twice gone back to
Japan for major revamping but
was very publicly being humiliat-
ed at nearly every outing. Instead
of "New Racer," the motor racing
press had dubbed the Honda NR
the "Nearly Ready."
In the United States, Honda
had hired a promising up-and-
coming racer from Louisiana
named Freddie Spencer to race
Superbikes. Spencer's talent
was undeniable. He could ride
and win on anything, and when
his bikes stayed together under
him, he won more often than not.
In July of 1981, Honda de-
cided to give Spencer a shot at
racing the third-generation NR.
The venue would be the AMA
National at Laguna Seca. The
race, under skilled promotion
by Gavin Trippe and Bruce Cox,
was supplanting Daytona as the
road race in America. With no GP
here at the time, Laguna marked
the opportunity to see America's
stars who were competing on the
GP circuit.
"Honda wanted the American
fans to see the NR before they
put it in a museum," Spencer
recalled. "Even though the bike
was not producing results, it was
an engineering marvel, and was
so far ahead of its time in tech-
nology, it helped give Honda the
background it needed to later
produce its V-fours."
Spencer never had a chance
to even sit on the bike prior to
Laguna, as his first laps were in
practice for the race. The NR
was unlike anything Spencer had
ever ridden.
"It would idle at 6000 rpm,"
Spencer said with a smile. "It was
a weird feeling riding it. It didn't
have enough weight on the front.
It felt like it had a very little engine
turning way up in the rpm range.
The powerband was supposed to
be from 13,000 to around 19 to
The NR500 was too complicated for its own good.
How would you like to work on this on race day?