#2019HondaCRF450L

The first thought that went through my head when our former bro, Brent Jaswinski, was assigned to attend the Honda CRF450L launch was, “Damn, that’s going to be a fun one.” The new Honda dual-sport was a much-anticipated model with promises of real trail bike performance in a plated package. Did it live up to the hype? Well, I couldn’t wait for Brent to write his review. So, I shot him a text, “How was it?” To be honest, I’m pretty sure I texted him while he was still at the launch for the bike. I was curious, as was the rest of the world, about whether this new model would be a thrilling performance-driven machine, or yet another soft polite dual-sport with street bike mentality. I don’t remember exactly, but I’m pretty sure he responded with something along the lines of, “It rips!” It was at that moment I couldn’t wait to start planning a comparison of the Honda CRF450L against the time-tested king of dual-sports the KTM 500 EXC-F.

If you haven’t already heard by now, Honda set the motorcycle industry on fire Wednesday with the announcement of its 2019 CRF off-road, motocross and dual-sport – yes, you read that right – dual-sport model lineup. While upgrades and improvements to current models are always exciting and welcomed news, the announcement of the all-new CRF450L is something that really took us by surprise, and ought to make some big waves in the motorcycle world.

Honda just stepped its game up big time for 2019, with the release of the ‘CRF Collective.’ There are three all-new models to look forward to including a CRF250RX, a CRF450RWE (Works Edition), and get this, a long-awaited and only dreamed of before, CRF450L dual-sport. (!!!) If that wasn’t exciting enough on its own, Honda just about completely redesigned its ‘King of the Trail’, top dog, Baja-dominating CRF450X. The rest of the CRF lineup got the full treatment as well, with significant upgrades and improvements to the CRF450R, CRF450RX, CRF250R and CRF150R models.