How will Trey and the Electric Honda do at Saitama?

Honda CR ELECTRIC PROTO shows leading pace in valuable debut weekend in Saitama

Team HRC completes a successful competitive debut for the CR ELECTRIC PROTO in Japanese Motocross

After a successful qualifying run yesterday, Sunday’s race day brought mixed fortunes for Team HRC but a race-leading demonstration of pace of the new CR ELECTRIC PROTO.

In the morning’s practice, Trey Canard followed on seamlessly from his Saturday pace to go second fastest on the all-electric #41, making its global competitive debut this weekend.

Then came the first ever race for Honda’s new prototype machine, in the form of JMX Rd.8 Heat 1. The opening race was smooth, with Canard starting strongly, settling into a rhythm and crossing the line second aboard the CR ELECTRIC PROTO. As learning, development and ultimately the pace continued to improve throughout the weekend, Canard closed to just 0.7s off the fastest lap and was looking fast.

In the second heat, Canard again started well and looked to be set to keep building on the weekend’s momentum, but an early crash with heat 1 rival Jay Wilson unfortunately ruled him out of the race.

Returning for the third heat, Canard made best use of the Honda’s instant electric torque and again started strongly, taking the lead exiting the first corner. In fact, Canard took two of the three holeshots on CR ELECTRIC PROTO.

Starting to stretch that lead from his weekend-long rival, the #27 of Wilson, it would have been the perfect culmination of the weekend’s learning and work on the CR ELECTRIC PROTO to take the machine’s first win in its first ever competitive weekend - but unfortunately, as the track continued to get ever more rutted, Canard crashed with 12 and a half minutes remaining of the 15-minute race.

Nonetheless, with the opportunity provided by racing to learn, develop and prove the prototype machine in the heat of battle for the first time, it has been a successful and encouraging debut for the CR ELECTRIC PROTO - a weekend which has provided valuable data for ongoing development of Honda’s all-electric motocross initiative.

Trey Canard, no.41 CR ELECTRIC PROTO

“This weekend was definitely a big challenge for me but it was a great race for our development. Each time I was on the track we improved the motorcycle and the CR ELECTRIC PROTO team adapted to the challenge. 

“We had some shines of brilliance as a team, the starts being one of them with two of the three holeshots. There were also some sections on the track that were very impressive and that makes me excited for the future of this motorcycle. 

“I’m disappointed to not finish all of the motos after all of the hard work the team has put in but I think we showed that the potential of the bike is quite high especially for our very first attempt at racing. I’m grateful to be a part of this effort and I’m very proud of each and every person who has worked so hard.”

Taichi Honda, Team HRC Team Manager

“First of all, I would like to thank the development team and everyone involved for preparing the CR ELECTRIC PROTO to be ready for competition in such a short time.

“I would also like to thank Trey Canard for showing his potential even though he has only had a few tests.

“We had three heats for the first time today and we will take what we learnt from each race and feed it back to the ongoing development of the CR ELECTRIC project.” 

Heard that in his interview.. clearly to me a slight slip of the tongue knowing Honda obsesses over these prototype vs pre-production vs production definitions.

I think he was referring to production testing ICE bikes, as well as, development (not production testing) of the e-bike. 

Honestly that was impressive, more than I expected, that's great news to have another competitive EMX in the works.

Did I already mention it would be cool to get some specs? Weight, battery capacity, power?

That scrub/whip before accident with Wilson was pretty sweet and made me think he was going for it. Lets hope this kicks other factories to come out with their Prototypes soon. 

I haven’t heard the interviews, did Trey say anything about what production testing he’s working on? It’s a safe assumption that he’s working on the 250/450 gassers, but it seems like he’s spending some time on the battery bikes too. 
 

I feel like Honda has done a lot more development on the CRF-E than we realize. 

Trey said...

"Kind of the plan all year for me was to come over here and start helping with some production testing and some different testing, so it just kind of got thrown into the mix."

That sounds like he's in Japan for production testing CRF's, and the CR electric was added to his testing.

Or.. "production testing" refers to CR-E, and "It" refers to the All Japan MX Race. So as we've heard more famously years ago, it depends on what "it" means! (Bad humor intended) 🤣

they have had this bike ready for years.. just waiting for the market to open up

Might be, now they have a competitor to benchmark against.

Trey Canard is an AMA champion.  
As a general rule I give AMA champs the benefit of the doubt.   He’s in the top %1 of riders on the planet.   I’ll listen to his critique of electric bike.  
 

I want one!

Lol one off race and canard still manages to crash and allegedly hurt himself (wrist) 

never change trey 

Kevin Sherman would have got the job done 

I reckon the tether is more about learned behaviour.  On an ICE bike it’s easy to tell if it’s still running when tipped over.  When it’s running people know to pull in the clutch or at the very least avoid the throttle when picking it up.  If it’s dead then you pick it up whatever way you want because it’s not going to rev or do anything.

A “live” e-bike is indistinguishable from a dead ICE bike; could easily see people instinctively grabbing the throttle grip out of habit on what looks like a dead bike and launching it in an unintended direction.

I like the idea of having a lever on the bars that acts similar to a clutch, more like a master power reduction, where the grip can be twisted wide open and the lever will modulate power down, in case of whiskey throttle. Safety lanyard won't stop that.

Bike looked good.

I aree that the first company that develops a clutch into their drivetrain will have a huge advantage over the competition. 

https://www.vitalmx.com/forums/moto-related/flux-performance-announces-…

Riders will get use to no clutch, but old habits will be hard to break...

I don't care what you EV boys say, these bikes need a clutch for the throttle delivery feel. Otherwise guys will be looking like flapping chickens trying to twist the hell outta their wrists for the same effect thru a corner.

You're not capable of learning new skills?