INTERVIEW
JCR RACING'S JOHNNY CAMPBELL
P84
Last year hailed the arrival of
Honda's new CRF450RX, the
first of an all-new platform for
Big Red that fills the gap be-
tween their 450X trail bike and
the 450R motocrosser. Honda's
foray into the competition off-
road race bike arena has been
a long time coming, and much
like the 450X, and its predeces-
sor, the venerated XR650R,
the development of the RX was
spurred in large part by Camp-
bell and crew.
As with Honda, Johnny
Campbell plays it close to the
vest when it comes to trade
secrets, but we recently sat
down with him to talk about his
hand in guiding the development
of Honda's off-road race bikes
spanning three decades, from
his early years on the XR650R
all the way through to Honda's
all-new CRF450RX.
Tell us about the new RX.
The new RX model is targeted
toward closed-course competi-
tion in the off-road arena. It's
more or less our cross-country
bike for GNCC, WORCS racing,
GP-style racing, but also very
pleasing to a very wide range
of customers going from even a
serious motocrosser all the way
to a casual trail rider. It really
covered a gap in our lineup of
having a full 450R motocrosser
and a 450X off-roader. It has
the latest technology based off
the [2017] CRF450R motocross
model; the R and the RX share
the same chassis and suspen-
sion components. The RX has a
different setting in the suspen-
sion, but same swingarm, same
linkage, subframe. It's all the
same components to start with a
very good base, then it's tuned
for off-road racing.
And it's still a capable
motocross bike, right?
Yeah, I really feel that the RX
that is suitable for many guys
that want to come race a moto-
cross race, and want to go trail
(Right) Campbell, here in
his signature "JC tuck,"
dominated Baja racing for
more than a decade.
(Left) Though he has
retired from racing, the 11-
time Baja 1000 champion
will always be synonymous
with the 1X plate.
