Last year, the big news at EICMA was the Africa Twin, and all Honda’s wacky concept adventure bikes.
This year, Big Red combined those two, to build the Africa Twin Enduro Sports concept. So Wot’s It All About?
This concept machine is mostly based on the CRF1000L Africa Twin, but with bits from Honda’s CRF450 Rally bike integrated to cut weight. Bodywork has been changed to look more dangerous (a smaller screen to stay out of the way off-road), and hey, look — someone bolted on a Termignoni exhaust, looking like it was ripped off a Dakar machine …
But, will anything come of it? One one hand, there’s certainly lots of money to be made in diversifying your adventure bike lineup — BMW, Suzuki, Triumph, et. al. have realized this, and have different editions of their flagship ADV steeds on the market to fill specific niches.
On the other hand, Honda’s been known to tease us with juicy adventure bike concepts before, then not follow through. Take these CBR650-based machines from last year’s EICMA show — tantalizing, but never released. At least, not yet. So, don’t get your hopes up at this point.
GALLERY
Check out all the pics that go with this story!
I want a 450 fuel injected twin adv bike.
Build this!!
Aaron Boudreau
I’ll take two.
How would we know if it’s better than the current version? It’s not like we even get the original in Canada. If what I heard is correct, they only brought in fifty of them. Not quite unicorns, but close.
Earthquake in Japan disrupted part supply for that bike. Delivery was an issue across the board I think.
Apparently it wasn’t just me.
Hah! Yes, I agree. Fixed it just before I saw your comment, but appreciate the feedback!
And I appreciate you filling the interwebs with cool bike info. Cheers.
When you say they have “dropped” a concept bike, to me that means they will not build it. Or is it just me.
Not that keen on it. Why make light weight Adventure bikes (CRF250 Rally) and heavy dirt bikes?
Couldn’t agree with you more
I guess Honda is not listening, we want a modern middleweight adv bike with off road cred.
Yes more interesting than the actual version.