With fresh ?Neo-Sports Café? styling, an updated engine and chassis, throttle-by-wire with multiple riding modes, new instrumentation and a lower curb weight, Honda?s CB1000R gets a new lease on life. Photos by Kevin Wing.
Since its 2011 debut (read our Road Test Review here), the Honda CB1000R has languished. It arrived when American buyers weren’t particularly interested in naked bikes, and its mediocre performance and ho-hum styling didn’t help. But what a difference a few years can make.
Naked bike sales have more than doubled since 2012, and the average buyer is 45-55 years old with two decades of riding experience–middle-agers (like me!) who don?t want bikes that look like they rolled out of a video game. Honda has responded by transforming the CB1000R from a run-of-the-mill naked sportbike into a modern café racer. Read our First Look Review of the 2019 CB650R and CBR650R.
The CB1000R’s smooth in-line four packs a punch above 7,000 rpm, and the entire package is tidy and refined.
Park the previous CB1000R next to a new one and you’d never know they’re so closely related. Replacing the swoopy bodywork is a stocky profile with harder lines, more exposed metal and a classic round headlight nacelle housing a modern LED. Black paint with bits of contrasting silver and machined edges on the engine give the new CB1000R an edgy, industrial look.
But the reinvention is more than skin deep. Honda says the CB’s liquid-cooled, 998cc, D...