‘It ate its sprockets at Suzuka!’
In 1999 Yoshimura created a Hayabusa like no other – the Yoshimura X-1 was purpose-built to compete in that year’s Suzuka 8-hour in the X-Formula class. During the race the highly tuned 225bhp engine managed to chew two rear sprockets, while the extreme lean angles tore away both sides of the fairing. The bike still finished 16th.
The Yoshi race mechanics dubbed the bike ‘Heavy Bus’ which was slightly unfair given that, fully fuelled, the X-1 weighed a remarkable 200kg. It went on to win the X-Formula championship so Yoshimura decided to produce a limited run of 100 road-going replicas by way of a celebration – only one of which made it to the UK.
A near identical replica of the race bike, the X-1R road bike pushed out in excess of 190bhp courtesy of a full Yoshi tune-up, while the chassis positively dripped in exotic Japanese finery. Beneath a ported and polished head, complete with titanium valves, sat a pair of Yoshimura ST-1 camshafts and four high compression (12:1) pistons. This was all teamed to a lightened crankshaft via a set of lightened, toughened rods. Combustion gases then escaped via the stunning full Titanium Tri-Oval system.
In fact the only elements consistent with a standard Hayabusa of that era was the frame and wheels – everything else was straight from the Yoshi racing parts store.