Photography by J.A. Ackley
And some more photos, courtesy Acura:
It’s the same question Honda appears to be asking when they unveiled the Acura Type S HRC Prototype during Monterey Car Week. The car features a wide array of aftermarket parts that Honda could potentially sell to customers through an HRC Performance Parts line.
“Why not? We race everything, from lawnmowers to whatever we can get our engines on,” says Jon Ikeda, Senior Vice President, Honda Racing Corporation USA. “We’re at the pinnacle of racing, and it’s time to focus a little bit on this side of things. We’re considering [launching this line], depending how everybody reacts.”
Many OEMs offer performance parts, such as Nismo and TRD, so there’s a market there.
“All the racing has been focused around developing engineers and coming up with innovative ideas,” Jon explains. “Today, it’s like why don’t we leverage a little more of the winning?”
HRC said they’re watching the response that people have to this announcement, but not only from the public.
“It’s also important that the people internally want it, too,” says Jon. “Because at the end of the day, when we’re making things, it’s about the people. Whatever they love … it shows up in the product. You can see a lot of love went into this thing.”
Honda’s known for its employees who love motorsport. The company’s after-hours race teams, such as HART, frequent events around the country.
[What happens after work at Honda? Some go race–and win]
“They are our inspiration,” Jon says of HART. “People like the HART teams and their enthusiasm is why we’re confident we need to do things like this.”
The line of HRC performance parts is geared toward the occasional track day enthusiast who still enjoys driving their car on the street. HRC said the many of the parts are derived from the ones used on the Acura Integra Type S HRC TCX race car. Most of the items on the Acura displayed were bolt-on items, such as bigger and better brakes, wheels, suspension, aerodynamic elements, lightweight body panels, Recaro seats, carbon-fiber cover for a rear seat delete, larger intercooler, twin oil coolers and exhaust. In fact, the company says they can reduce the weight of the Integra Type S by nearly 200 pounds with these easy-to-install parts and an a/c delete.
Jon’s excited about the prospect about Honda offering performance parts. After all, he’s a race fan, too.
“If I wasn’t given a ticket to go see the ’89 Suzuka Grand Prix, when I was on the fence between going to Honda and going to another OEM, I saw Senna, I saw Prost,” Jon reminisces. “Then it’s 34 years later and I’m working on something like this at HRC, it’s a dream come true.”
And some more photos, courtesy Acura:
I've heard this song before...
Somewhere around here I have a copy of the old Mugen catalog, all of which was available through Honda dealerships.
Reminds me of digging through the HFP catalog when I was dreaming of a first car.
(not my car)
My Honda Haiku for a slow Friday:
Hi, we are Honda.
We get cooler by the day
Drinking the Koolaid?
Was wondering when they'd do yellow. Did they name the color?
Mmmmm OEM oil coolers. Me like for my Type R.
In reply to Andy Hollis :
LMAO because I clearly remember hearing that song too! The only manufacturer i had the great experience of being able to get manufacturer performance/race parts through the dealer easily was Nissan when it was still Datsun here. Datsun Competition catalog was my bible cause the dealer would just order up anything in it for me if they didn't have it. Days of old.......
I assumed HRC always dealt in motorcycles.
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