‘One giant leap for motorcycling’ says Mat Oxley, who crashed the first Honda RC30 to reach Britain in 1988, then rode one to second in the 1990 Spa 24 Hours
It’s the only new-model press release I still rememberseeing for the first time. When news of Honda’s RC30 arrived in the autumn of 1987, I was editing Performance Bikes magazine – Iopened the envelope, gawped at the photos and knew the world had changed.
At the start of the 1980s the world’s sharpest sports bike was either Honda’s CB900F or Suzuki’s GSX1100 Katana. Those machines made 95 and 101 horsepower and weighed 233 and 240 kilos. The 750cc RC30 made 125 horsepower and weighed 180 kilos. One giant leap for motorcycling.
Performance Bikes got the first RC in Britain, which I promptly crashed, by colliding with a Suzuki GSX-R750 during a photoshoot for a comparison road test. The GSX-R had dominated racing since its arrival in 1985, but the RC made it feel slow, wobbly and ancient. This wasn’t just a lookie-likie race replica – it was a race bike, designed specifically to win the new World Superbike championship.
Howard Lees Racing (otherwise known as Team Bike and Team MCN) got its first RC30s in 1989, thanks to a big fat cheque from That’s cassette tapes in Japan. From 1986 to 1988 we had raced various Yamaha FZ750s in the endurance world championship – some with stock chassis, others with Harris frames.
They were good, but racing the RC30 was like racing in a different era. At last, here was a with bike with which you could do what the GP superstars did – square off corners when you wanted, use corner speed when
