Stunning Crate-Fresh Yamaha OW-01 Heads to Auction
The Yamaha OW-01 was a ground-breaking homologation bike when it was launched, and this is a true time-warp example of it
As-new bikes that are still locked in their delivery crate come around now and then, but few make us stop and take notice quite like this Yamaha OW-01 has.
The bike is up for auction over on Iconic Motorbikes, and to say that this is just about as original as OW-01s get is a massive understatement. For starters, only 500 examples of the FZR750R (better known by its OW-01 codename) were produced. And while you could buy them from a Yamaha dealers and legally ride them on the road, this bike had a greater purpose.
It was Yamaha’s homologation machine that opened the doors to the burgeoning Superbike World Championship - now known as World Superbike/WorldSBK. Honda had the RC30, and Yamaha had the OW-01, and both are now heralded as halo machines in any 1980s or 1990s race bike collection.
That reputation among collectors, and the bike’s increasing scarcity in the modern market, is pushing prices up. And as is the way with collectors, they want the most original, unmolested example they can get their hands on. And you don’t get much more original than still in its crate, unstarted, apart from for testing at the factory, and with an odometer that has only ticked over to 1.1 kilometres.
Iconic Motorbikes notes that the machine was bought in August 2013, from Moto 2001 in Quebec, Canada and that since then it has been kept “in a heated and cooled motorcycle museum room” on the owner's property. As they have only used the bike as a display piece, and as IM haven’t fully inspected the machine, it’s being sold as a display piece. That means, should you want to ride it, you’re going to have to do a significant amount of recommissioning work before you fire it up.
Right, now the elephant in the room: the price. Fancy adding this beautiful OW-01 to your garage? You’ll need to be comfortable bidding in the $80,000 (£60,000) region - and you’ll need to get to California to pick it up.
Good luck getting that through hand luggage!
You can check out the listing for yourself here.
Images from Iconic Motorbikes
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Simon (AKA Toad) has been working within the motorcycle industry for more than twelve years, and a member of the motorcyclist family since birth. Growing up around British-built single and twins, it was inevitable that a life on two wheels was on the cards, from a very early age!
