HONDA, which had earlier announced that its works team will take on Rally Dakar (to be held in January 2013 in Peru, Chile and Argentina), recently unveiled the new CRF450 Rally model Dakar racer at the Intermot Bike Fair in Cologne, Germany.

The company’s scheduled Dakar outing, as riders worth their Camelbaks know, is not its first as Honda had competed nine times already in the legendary Paris-Dakar Rally, from 1981 to 1989, winning five times during those years. But why it’s taking the company almost a quarter of a century to get back on the Dakar saddle is anyone’s guess.

Anyway. The new CRF450 Rally is based on Honda’s production CRF450X off-road racer but which, expectedly, received a number of tweaks. These include a remapped version of Honda’s Programmed Fuel Injection system, a larger tank to ensure the bike does not run out of fuel while it is somewhere in nowhere, sophisticated navigation to make sense out of that nowhere, and sundry bodywork and chassis protection to guarantee it survives the getting-out-of-nowhere part. Honda said the CRF450 Rally had already undergone extensive testing in Japan, and was tested further in its race debut at Rally Morocco in mid-October.

Riding for the Honda Dakar contingent—under the ubiquitous Honda racing Corp. (HRC) banner—are the multinational group of Johnny Campbell (an 11-time Baja 1000 champion who also has Dakar experience in Africa), Helder Rodrigues, Felipe Zanol, Sam Sunderland and Javier Pizzolito.

“The Dakar requires competitors to cover several hundred kilometers per day for more than two weeks,’ said HRC President Tetsuo Suzuki, whose last name is proof positive of Japanese meritocracy. “It needs a totally different type of vehicle from events such as motocross, trials and road races. Honda has put a great deal of effort into designing and building a powerful and winning machine. We are aiming for the championship from this first year.”

In its previous Dakar campaigns, Honda said its rider Cyril Neveu in 1982 was the first to clinch a win for the team. Neveu’s victory was replicated from 1986 to 1989 when Honda won four consecutive titles, totaling a record five victories in nine years.

“Previously, we entered Rally Dakar with machines that are purpose-built for racing. This time, we are aiming for our first victory with a production-based motorcycle,” Suzuki said.

For his part, Campbell said that his previous participation in Dakar has been an “amazing experience,” and that his role this time around is to “provide consultancy, developmental, rider and mechanical services as needed in the project.”