IN
THE
WIND
P26
HONDA UNVEILS AFRICA TWIN SPORTS CONCEPT
A
s the name suggests, this bike is just a concept, for now. But if the worldwide reaction to the Hon-
da Africa Twin of 2016 is anything to go by, this new Africa Twin Sports Concept, recently unveiled
by Honda in Japan, could be the next great big-bore adventure machine to come out of Japan.
The Sports Concept is basically Honda's answer to the BMW R 1200 GS Adventure and KTM 1190
Adventure R—a jacked up, beefed up version of the standard Africa Twin with all the stuff you'll need to
take you far away into the dirty distance.
Details aren't very flowing at this stage, although the Sports Concept is seen here with reinforced un-
derbody protection, chunky knobby tires wrapped around spoked gold rims, a single seat platform and
luggage rack and an exhaust that wouldn't look out of place on Joan Barreda's factory Honda Dakar
racer.
The Africa Twin could be signaling a chang-
ing of the guard within Honda's mindset, as the
company, traditionally focused on big-bore road
bikes, gets serious with large capacity adventure
riding. Also in the rumor mill, the CRF250 Rally
we reported on last year continues to grow with
more than a few industry insiders suggesting this
could be a 2017 model from the world's largest
motorcycle manufacturer. CN
WEIMER OKAY
R
CH/Soaring Eagle/Jimmy John's Suzuki's
Jake Weimer says he's in for this week's
Monster Energy AMA Supercross race at Levi's
Stadium in Santa Clara, California, April 2.
Weimer crashed in the 450SX main event in
Detroit (March 19) and dislocated his shoulder,
preventing him from finishing the race. Luckily for
him, the series took its first break of the season
the following weekend, so he had some extra
time to heal up.
Via his Instagram account, Weimer said he's
good to go for this weekend's race: "…I got an
MRI and I got lucky and didn't tear anything. It's
happened to me one time before, a few years ago,
and the [doctor] told me it looks better now than
it did last time I saw him a couple years ago. So
no riding this week, just letting it rest and doing
therapy and I'll be good to go for Santa Clara! I did
a full training day today and it feels good." CN
The Beast of 1000 Trails: Please, please,
Honda, build this bike!
Jake Weimer says he'll
suit up for the Santa
Clara Supercross.
