The Honda CBR150. Can it beat the Yamaha R15?

During the motorsport event organized at the Chennai race-track by Honda Motorcycles and Scooters India (HMSI) last month, the company had something extra to offer to the enthusiasts. Apart from the Novice CBF Stunner class, Honda also involved the existing expert riders from the UCAL ROLON National Road Racing Championship to race its baby race-bike, the Honda CBR150. This small capacity CBR is sold by Honda in South-East Asia and it is raced in the Honda Asean Cup held in Thailand every year.

HMSI had imported a total of fifteen CBR150 bikes and the top ten expert riders were allowed to race them at the Honda Motorsport Event. Luckily, yours truly happened to be one of the ten riders for the final race! Do not go by the size of the bike. Sure, it does look tiny in size, but it goes like stink for a 150cc motorcycle. The obvious question troubling most readers would be, is it faster than the Yamaha YZF-R15? Direct comparison with Yamaha's premium 150cc offering is inevitable and the answer is yes, it is faster than the YZF-R15, but just.

The 149.4cc liquid cooled DOHC 4-stroke motor of the Honda is rev-happy and has a strong pull right from 3000rpm. The power delivery is extremely refined and the CBR feels like it's on rails! The bike makes 17PS of power at 10,500rpm and a humble yet enough, 13.06Nm of torque at 8500rpm. The bike redlines at 11,500rpm that is 1000rpm higher than the Yamaha R15. The power delivery on the Honda too comes from lower revs, precisely from 3500 rpm as against the higher-revving nature of the R15 motor which starts singing only after 7000rpm.

In terms of power figures, there isn't a lot of difference in both the bikes but thanks to the peppy motor and 7kg lighter frame, the Honda is quicker than the Yamaha. At the Chennai circuit, the stock Honda CBR150 motorcycles ridden by expert riders posted the fastest lap time of 2 min 12 seconds around the long loop. The tuned and modified Yamaha YZF-R15 motorcycles currently running in the championship Experts class ridden by same riders along the same full loop are posting laptimes in the region of 2 mins 13-14 seconds. That means with a minor tweaks to the Honda, this two second difference between the lap times can be increased even more.

Though the Honda outshines the Yamaha in engine performance, in the handling department its feather weight chassis and tiny size work against it. The CBR150 lacks the handling prowess of the Yamaha R15 and on high-speed corners it does not inspire enough confidence. The Honda is more agile and flickable out of the two but it is not as composed as the Yamaha and fails to tackle the mid-corner bumps with smoothness and surety. On the other hand, the Yamaha YZF-R15 is a composed and brilliant handling machine which allows the rider to push it to the limits.

Going by existing laptimes, there is a good chance that the CBR150 will outrun the YZF-R15 on the track. But then again, we should also consider that Yamaha had to cater to the masses with different riding tastes and also take care of factors like fuel efficiency and comfort, while Honda could focus entirely on performance, thanks to the performance dedicated buyers in the South-East Asian market who are open to track racing culture.

The only real way to find out would be to have the factory teams of both these Japanese bike majors' slug it out in our National Championship. But for that to happen, Honda will have to launch the CBR150 in the country. As of now the big 'H' has not disclosed any plans to launch the CBR150 in India. Let's keep our fingers crossed!

Emmanuel Clarke (Expert Class rider & Honda CBR150 Race Winner):

"The Honda is very easy to ride around tight circuits. It is extremely agile and nimble around corners. Compared to the Yamaha YZF-R15, the Honda's engine revs quicker and provides solid grunt from lower revs. The only shortfall I noticed on the Honda was its instability through high-speed corners and bumps. That is mostly because of the weight and small size of the bike. As this was our first time on the CBR150 it took us sometime to get used to the bike and push it. I think a little fiddling with the suspension might improve the feel on the Honda around fast corners."

HONDA CBR150 Specifications

YAMAHA YZF-R15 Specifications