Rarely when riding a motorcycle, do we ask ourselves who was behind the project of that model, or how the creation was born.
In general, behind the simplicity of motorcycle, there is a chain of market research, technological development and at times also the passion and intuition of one person.
Great stories of passion are often linked to smaller companies and niche models, while larger companies often travel the straight and clear road.
Which is why we wanted to re-tell the story of the new CB1000R, having a human touch in which its creator shows his spirit of initiative that brought the model to bear.
If we look at the new Honda CB1000R, you can see straight away that this model breaks the mold of Japanese production.
It looks like a Special, created in a workshop, or an authentic streetfighter like those appreciated by French riders.
Rather, it comes off a large production line and has the Honda symbol on the tank, perhaps the most traditionalist and conservative of Japanese brands.
This time, hidden behind the bike, is the face of a person, passionate about Honda, but most surprisingly, a European – an extroverted and extravagant Italian designer, and the team who worked with him to create this bike.
Paolo Cuccagn is nice guy, nearly two metres tall, dressed casually (long hair, looks a bit like a rapper), who cuts to the chase, speaking clearly and directly.
He’s a designer in the R&D division at Honda Europe, and vice-director of the Style Centre, which as luck would have it, is based in Rome.
Paolo is not only passionate about motorcycles, but he’s a true, authentic Roman, with the sunny character that goes with it.
With a desire to talk about motorcycles, and always ready with a joke, he transmits his passion and demonstrates his initiative, and design intuition for the CB1000: intuition which we found on the first time we sat on the seat and gave it some gas.
Next to Paolo in the moment of conceiving and giving form to this lovely bike, was the more accademic Daniele Lucchesi, planning manager of the italian R&D division, becoming not just a colleague, but a friend of Paolo over the years.
The idea for the bike came from an evening stranded by snow at a hotel and not being able to get an aeroplane.
Together with six guys from the Honda style centre, at a table over a beer, they tell the story of the idea behind the bike, starting on a piece of paper, the first drafts and lines of the embryo that magically took form.
A long road started, through the corridors of Honda bureaucracy, to battle for a model that didn’t come from the top down, but from a table in Italy and some guys who wanted to make something.
Here the value of the model can be felt, which knits itself with the stories of the design team, and their friendship, giving the bike a personality beyond company management and production lines.
Some stubborness was required to beat down company plans and bureaucracy in the Tokyo giant.
During the feasibility study with the first drafts and the initial clay model, the future of the CB1000R found itself an ally in Vito Cicchetti, another two-metre tall Italian, who happens to be the General Director of Honda Italia.
At that point Honda Japanese reticence melted away in the face of the comvincing and potent figure of Cicchetti.
Our story remains a human one as at this point, giving the sinuous and turbulent lines of the CB, a engineer was required for riding dynamics and technical specs.
And so a Japanese engineer joined the fray, taking to heart the CB project and caring for it to the moment in which it took its first steps.
His name is Tetsuya Kudo, and he is a tester and engineer with Honda Japan, and loves taking the new models out for a test spin on the Suzuka track.
In his hands the bike passed into the manufacturing stage, along with previous models he’s worked on including the Honda RC 30 and the NR 750.
In our chat with Kudo, he doesn’t hide his personal involvement and pride in this bike, letting out an “my own bike”, while discussing the model.
And from the extravagant designer from Rome, to the practical Japanese engineer, our story ends, with Paolo riding off on the realisation of his winter night’s draft.
This time though, the drawings didn’t end up shut in a drawer of a large company somewhere, but came to life through a little luck and a whole lot of courage from the men involved.