At Silverstone Spencer got a terrible start, but moved up to as high as fifth before the famous Honda NR500 started slowing. Here Spencer, on No. 17, runs with a group that includes Michel Frutschi (23), Stuart Avant (directly behind Spencer), Alex George (49) and Dale Singleton (30). (Photos courtesy Honda)

In July of 1981 Honda decided to give Spencer a shot at racing its third generation Honda NR500, the revolutionary oval piston, four-stroke Grand Prix machine, which had failed miserably in GP racing. The venue would be the AMA National at Laguna Seca. The race, under skilled promotion by Gavin Trippe and Bruce Cox, was supplanting Daytona as the road race in America. With no GP at the time, Laguna marked the opportunity to see America’s stars who were competing on the GP circuit.

“Honda wanted the American fans to see the NR before they put it in a museum,” Spencer recalls. “Even though the bike was not producing results, it was an engineering marvel and was so far ahead of its time in technology it helped give Honda the background it needed to later produce its V-Fours.”

Spencer never had a chance to even sit on the bike prior to Laguna. His first laps were in practice for the race. The NR was unlike anything Spencer had ever ridden.

“It would idle at 6000 rpm,” Spencer smiles. “It was a weird feeling riding it. It didn’t have enough weight on the front. It felt like it had a very little engine turning way up in the rpm range. The powerband was supposed to be from 13,000 to around 19-20,000 rpm, but no… it wasn’t torquey enough to run well at the lower rpm. I geared it to where I was shifting it all the time. I figure the powerband that worked for me was 18 to 21,000, so I was over-revving it a bit. We had no rev limiters back then.”

By the second session Spencer was figuring out how to ride the NR. He was making it work by wringing the little NR’s neck.

In practice Spencer’s times on the NR were promising, but no one, even in the Honda camp could have dreamed what would happen in the heat race.

A close-up view of Freddie Spencer cornering Honda’s revolutionary oval piston NR500 at Silverstone. While the NR was not considered a major success, the engineering Honda used in its amazing Honda NR750 street bike, the most expensive street motorcycle ever sold at today’s equivalent of $90,000.

“It was only five laps,” Spencer said. “I figured anything could hold together for five laps. I knew the only hope of beating Kenny was to push the bike past its limits. They told me not to rev it over twenty-and-a-half, but I thought, ‘Wouldn’t it be great if we could win something on this bike.’ So I revved to 21 to 21-and-a-half running down the hill that is now Rainey. There was no way I could have been competitive against the two-strokes had I ran the thing down around 13-14,000 rpm.”

Spencer somehow made the bike last and rode the NR to a jaw-dropping victory over King Kenny Roberts. The win reverberated across the Pacific all the way to Honda headquarters in Japan.

“You talk about excited,” Freddie remembers. “The Japanese engineers were jumping up and down and people were running off to call Japan. You would have thought I won the world championship or something. They were so excited they said, ‘Let’s pack it up and go to Silverstone.’”

It almost didn’t matter that NR didn’t make the finish of either race at Laguna’s doubleheader. Like a gambler who’d hit big once in Las Vegas, Honda clung to Spencer’s heat race victory over Roberts like a kudzu to Georgia oak.

In just a few short weeks after Laguna, Spencer was flown to England to race NR in the British GP at Silverstone. The NR wasn’t going to the museum after all; Honda thought it had finally found the man who could win on the bike.

The trip to England didn’t go according to plan. On Spencer’s first try bump-starting the bike he jumped too high and landed on the tank with a thud, bruising his chest in the process. The practiced dozens of times until Freddie could start the bike in just two big steps.

On the track Spencer found the NR’s lack of torque almost humorous.

Riders ready for the start of the 1981 British Grand Prix at Silverstone with Kenny Roberts (1), Jack Middelburg (11) who won the race, Barry Sheene (7), Keith Huewen (21), Dave Potter (8), Freddie Spencer (17), Boet van Dulmen (6).

“Silverstone – big racetrack, tall gearing,” Spencer said. I’d come off the lefthander onto to Hanger Straight and there’d be a slight breeze and I shift the thing and it would drop rpm. I’d learn to tuck in everything. I think I qualified pretty well, maybe top ten. In the race I ran maybe fifth or sixth and in the points, but then the valve springs began to disintegrate.”

The stark reality hit Honda like a ton of bricks after Silverstone. It was plain for anyone to see that Honda had the most talented young road racer in the world in Spencer, but even Fast Freddie couldn’t work miracles with the NR.

Even before Spencer temporarily breathed new hope into the NR program, Honda had its contingency plan in the wings. The three-cylinder two-stroke NS500. Two years later Spencer would be world champion on the four-cylinder, two-stroke Honda NSR500.

“As the years have gone on the main thing about riding the NR,” Spencer said, “was that I was happy to see all the Honda people so happy with that Laguna heat-race win. They were so frustrated after pouring so much effort into the bike and getting no results, that when I beat Kenny they were on top of the world even if it was for just a short time.”