Check It Out: Electric, Hybrid Kawasaki Prototypes At Suzuka

[advrider]

Kawasaki’s going electric, and we have the video evidence to prove it. See below:

In case you don’t recognize that facility, it’s Suzuka Circuit, the legendary Japanese track that’s home to the Suzuka 8-Hour, perhaps the most important stop on the FIM Endurance World Championship tour. Supposedly, that’s where these machines were unveiled—in front of the fans at that race. Is that true? Uh, the stands look kinda empty, but there are definitely some people milling around.

What does it meeeeeannn?

So what was the point of this fly-by? Good question.

If nothing else, it firms up what we already knew: Kawasaki appears to be more serious about electric motorcycles than any other Japanese manufacturer. Or at least, it’s been running a very effective teaser campaign.

Look at the evidence. For years now, we’ve seen teasers for an electric sportbike program, showing what appears to be a full-sized sportbike—see here.

That was two years ago. Surely we would have seen something on the market by now, right?

Nope. Kawasaki gave us the bettery-powered Elektrode balance bike for kids, But wait, two new electric motorcycles are coming next year, that must be it, right? Again, nope—if our colleagues at Motorcycle.com got their figures right, then those bikes will basically be electric minicycles, street-legal, but similar to the existing Z125.

Well, that certainly doesn’t look like what we see above. Take heart, Team Green fans, it seems we shall see electric sportbikes yet, and if Kawi is showing them off at Suzuka, it can’t be toooooo much longer. Maybe we’ll see an Intermot or EICMA reveal this fall? Stay tuned.

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