The CRF1000L Africa Twin, Honda’s ADV offering has been in the market for the last four years and has a cult following in the premium ADV segment. It offers performance to compete with the bigger ADVs but also is friendly for someone who is looking for an ADV in the middle-weight segment.
But over this last weekend, Japanese auto magazine ‘Autoby’, hinted at a new CRF850L Africa Twin with a mock-up render. If this information turns out to be true, Honda will be making a true middle weight ADV which will take the fight to the new breed of middle weight ADV’s like the KTM 790 Adventure, BMW F850 GS, Triumph Tiger 800 and the Yamaha Tenere 700. The bike is expected to be powered by a similar parallel-twin to maintain compactness and smaller dimensions. If Honda does actually make this bike (which we hope they do) and stay true to their track record of making a high quality, affordable machine, it will definitely have the potential to hold its own against the biggies. The bike is expected to launch by 2021.
There was also news that an update to the current Africa Twin is in the works which bumps up its displacement to 1100, to bring in more power, competing against the big-bore offering from the Europeans, which include the Ducati Multistrada 1260, Triumph Tiger 1200 and the BMW R 1250 GS. Of course, there’s also the Kawasaki Versys 1000 from Japan. The future of ADVs definitely seems to be bright.
Source: ADV Pulse