Yoshimura Hayabusa X-1
Incredible as it might first appear, here is proof positive you can build a racebike from a hyperbike, and yet still have a perfectly rideable missile for the road, too
Sometimes we want what we can’t have. That’s how this very special Hayabusa came to be. Suzuki’s original GSX1300R had barely begun rolling off its Hamamatsu production line when Japanese tuning legends Yoshimura got to work creating the ultimate of its kind. That bike, the X-1R, was raced in the All-Japan Road Race X-Formula class – winning the title at its first attempt. Yoshimura also entered the X-1R into the Suzuka 8-Hour, where it finished sixteenth in 1999, and then sixth overall the following year with a class win to boot.
The X-1R’s race success prompted a road legal replica, the X-1, of which 100 were produced. German Yoshi fanatic Nabil Hireche fancied a lights-an’-all X-1 for himself (who wouldn’t?) but they sold out in Japan before he could get his name next to one, and Yoshimura weren’t going to extend their limited run for anyone.
Luckily, Hireche – adetermined type – figured that if Yoshimura wouldn’t build him one, he’d get someone else to create him one instead. That ‘someone’ was German specials builder and engineer extraordinaire Herbert Kainzinger. But don’t get the impression that this Suzook is some kind of pale imitation or visual pastiche, simply bolted together to satisfy Hireche’s desire to own something beyond his reach. No, this is a pukka X-1 in every sense, featuring the same engine, chassis, and parts spec as that limited run of 100 machines put together at Yoshimura’s premises.
Having been built and first used in Germany, this ultra ’Busa found its way across the Channel in 2017 and, more recently, into the hands of PS friend and specials builder/collector Warren ‘Woz’ Smart (you may remember his gorgeous GSX-R1100 from a few issues back). Woz knows what he likes and, as is becoming his modus operandi when adding to his ever-increasing collection of modified sportsbikes and ex-race machines, he bought this GSX on a whim.
“The X-1 is a bike that’s long been on my radar,” explains Woz. “I’d always liked them, but I never thought I’d end up owning one simply because they’re so rare and, to my knowledge, ther
