UK buyer is the world’s first owner of a Honda RC213V-S

On December 21, Honda delivered the RC213V-S to its first customer worldwide. The handover took place at Honda’s UK racing headquarters, where all of the machines sold in the UK will be prepared and serviced by specially-trained technicians.

The RC213V-S has been three years in development and is the closest a customer can come to owning and riding the RC213V MotoGP machine developed exclusively for racing, which won consecutive MotoGP World Championships in 2013 and 2014 in the hands of Marc Marquez.

The RC213V-S went on sale on July 13, 2015 with a price of £150,000 (Rs 1.47 crore) inclusive of tax in the UK. Each machine is hand-built in a specialist area of Honda’s Kumamoto factory.

The first owner of the Honda RC213V-S – a machine closer in concept, specification and riding feel to a MotoGP racer than any previous road legal motorcycle – is John Brown, who owns and runs a Honda motorcycle dealership in Manchester, UK and is an avid collector of Honda machines. The RC213V-S will sit in Brown’s extensive collection, which includes a brand new RC30, VTR1000 SP1 and SP2, CBR900RR Fireblade and VF1000F.

Commenting on becoming the world’s first customer for the RC213V-S, Brown said: “When I first heard of this project I thought ‘when this happens I have to have one of these’. It is a truly amazing opportunity to own a piece of HRC racing history. As soon as it went on sale I registered my interest on the website, and when I received the call from Honda to say my order was accepted it was a very special day for me. I joined my family business as a 17-year old and have been a Honda dealer ever since. My dealership has been one of the top-three in the UK for many years and the bike will be great with my existing collection. I’d like to thank all the people at Honda for making this dream come true.”

Tetsuo Suzuki, Operating Officer, Honda Motorcycles, commented: “Throughout the development process we have kept the RC213V-S as similar to the MotoGP machine as possible, so that the customer gets the closest experience to riding the RC213V as possible. The sales and interest in the bikes has been very strong, with some customers wanting to keep in collections and others wanting to ride.”