Photo: TMC Blog
The rumour factory at Japanese mag Young Machine is hard at work again; now, its trying to stir up interest in a Yamaha XSR300 cafe racer.
Ever since Yamaha brought the R3 sportbike to market, there’s been interest in naked versions of the platform. Yamaha started with the MT-03 naked bike, but now Young Machine is hinting at an XSR300 cafe racer in the works.
Of course, Yamaha has already done this with it’s uber-successful FZ-09 and FZ-07 platforms, developing them into the XSR700 and XSR900, intended to bring back the glory days of Yamaha’s XS lineup. In those heady times of the 1970s, Yamaha had all segments covered with the XS1100, XS750, XS650, XS500, and XS400. Young Machine reckons it’s time for a similar move now. The Japanese journos say Yamaha needs to turn its R3 into a cafe racer, and they’ve built a prototype for photos in their mag raiding the parts bin to slap together an interesting concept.
Take note that the bike here appears to be a Young Machine project, and if Yamaha is working on something similar, as Young Machine claims, it might look entirely different. But, what say ye? It’s no replacement for an RD350, but does this treatment of the R3 platform work?
Mt-03 would be the better bet for the North American markets. Lighter then the R3 but positioned as an entry level motorcycle. Likely slightly better slow to mid scale speeds due to less weight and wider bars. R3 would still have an aero advantage on the higher end of the speed spectrum. Trying to market an RD / RZ wanna be would be just writing cheques it’s ass can’t cash.
I’m so excited about this!!! It’s the updated RD from the 80’s without the smoke.
Well, if it really comes to pass, I suspect it will have quite a bit less snap than the RD did. But still pretty cool.
It won’t have that two stroke snap but it would be light and nimble.
So close ! Why not change a couple of things and be more authentic too your actual past. Make a XRD350
Dang. That’s pushing all manner of buttons for this guy. I so badly wanted a 350LC and never had the scratch to upgrade from my 400F. I like the styling treatment. Tough to call it a cafe racer though. Naked UJM, basically.
A slow clone of the iconic Elsie
This fuel tank make me think of the XJ650 Seca and the RD350LC. Would be great to see this model available here.
I still like the MT03 better.
? that looks good
that is amazing looking. I could be slightly biased since my first street bike was an RD350LC.