Jewel in the crown

To be fair, Blind Freddie could have recognised the RC30 as an instant classic from the moment it made its public bow. It’s a prime example of what Honda does from time to time; create something with a single purpose in mind, and spare no effort or expense in doing so.

In this case, the single purpose was to win the inaugural World Superbike Championship in 1988, which it (narrowly) achieved thanks to Fred Merkel’s skill and a small degree of luck. But a win is a win, and a championship – a World Championship, thank you – is even better, and Honda’s svelte V4 had earned its stripes in consummate fashion, although Merkel actually won only two of the sixteen races. Just to rub it in, Merkel swept to a second consecutive – and far more dominant – World Championship the following year on a developed version of the same machine. In fact it was a Honda RC30 1-2, with Belgian Stephane Mertens filling the runner up spot to the flamboyant American.

But the v-twins, they were coming, and perhaps with rules tweaked to favour, or at the very least encourage the European factories, Ducati began its rise to supremacy, something that miffed Honda into a severe re-think of the RC30, resulting in the fuel-injected RC45. But that is another story, and here we shall concern ourselves with a period in history that began in 1987 when the first batch of VFR750R Hondas was released to a slathering audience in Japan. Such was the machine’s instant charisma, and such was the effect of the carefully manipulated pre-release marketing campaign that decreed the new V4 would be available only to selected dealers in strictly rationed numbers, queues formed outside dealerships, and if