Honda has finally confirmed that it’s bringing the Africa Twin back to battle the BMW GS, Ducati Multistrada, and KTM 1190. It’s hitting Europe later this year, landing in the States in early 2016, and it’s also packing an off-road-tuned dual-clutch transmission.
The new Africa Twin is the successor to the Paris-Dakar-racing XRV650 and XRV750 built from 1989 to 2003. This new model, the CRF1000L, builds off that heritage, as well as some of the technology Honda employed during its return to Dakar in 2013.
We caught a glimpse of the new Africa Twin in concept form last year with the True Adventure prototype, and the teasers seem to remain true to that vision.
Honda hasn’t offered much in the way of specs, but it’s obviously powered by a 1,000cc parallel-twin and should be sending around 110 HP and a sizable dollop of torque to an optional dual-clutch transmission that Honda says, “has been specifically developed and programmed to provide the off-road ability with which the Africa Twin is synonymous.”
It’ll also be brimming with a fair amount of tech, including traction control, ABS, and some trick power settings to optimize it both for both off-roading and street blasts.
Expect more in the next few months.
Contact the author at damon@jalopnik.com.
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