Is the new Honda CBR5000R the best £6k you can spend?
Revamped CBR500R delivers serious big-bike bang for your buck
After riding Honda’s new CBR500R at its world launch in Tenerife last week, we can confirm that A2 licence-holders and lovers of middleweight sportsbikes should be prepared to be impressed by just how dazzling 47bhp can feel. Like the best big-bore sportsbikes, the 471cc parallel twin is smooth, packed with burbling character and a racy-but-roomy riding position. It’s stable and plush with an unquenchable appetite for corner speed. After all, it’s more exciting carving through a 60mph corner on a fizzing CBR500R, than doing the same on a Blade SP. With its new valve timing, bigger airbox and straighter inlet tracts the CBR500R now has a surprising amount of grunt, so there’s no need to chase gears and revs on a rainy commute, but it’s properly fast when you poke it with a stick. Breaking the ton is easy, which isn’t surprising when you realise it has the same power as the beloved Yamaha RD350LC. We never thought that was slow, did we? Unlike the two-stoke, the Honda has a wide spread of perfectly delivered power and its throttle, new assist and slipper clutch and gearbox are buttery and precise. A new Showa rear shock and fork internals, featuring progressive springs (hard in the middle, soft at the top and bottom) keeps the CBR500R composed when you jam it into corners like Marquez, or maintaining Lorenzo-like momentum. A single, wavy 320mm disc and twin piston Nissin caliper has decent power, but is best helped by using the rear to help stop the Honda.
Bars are now fitted beneath the top yoke, canting you eight degrees further forward, but the new riding position doesn’t hammer wrists and the seat is all-day cosy. LED headlights, blue anodised fork tops, MotoGP winglets and carbon effect fairing in-fill panels all sum up the attention to detail lavished on this 47bhp 500.
The new LCD dash now has a gear position indicator, and its Bladestyle screen is low, but manages to offer decent wind protection even for a taller rider.
The level of paint and finish wouldn’t look out of place on a 20-grand superbike, but you could get the new R for just £98.07 per month on PCP.
The CBR500R is in dealers now. O