but will it be as involving to drive as an NA k20, of course not, face it the days of Vtec and NA motors are gone, its all over.
If i could put up with my Ep3 daily i would but i know i will be replacing mine with a Championship edition FN2 in the new year as thats the last of the K20 equipped good cars.
We always talk on this site about Ek9 being rawer and better than EP3 and that being better than the fat FN2 and then the DC2 being better than all those combined but we forgot about the FD2, etc etc however in 2014 when this new civic type R hits our sures it truly will be the odd one out, Type R is the above all put together, an NA engine of modest outputs with a characterful nature. I'm fine with that and i can honestly say i doubt i will buy one as my choice will be larger and i could go for any of the other hothatches with the same ingredients already.
Anyone who owns a Type R now what ever model designation it is, has to agree that 80% of the attraction to the car is the engine. If Honda fail to relaise that ( which i think they do) then they will have to make up for it in another way. i believe the tripe about a Nurburgring time was part of this strategy. However i think that may backfire as if you go an have a drive in a Megane R26.r you will realise how amazing that car drives, the civic is a long way from that let alone the new Megaine RS which is in another league when compared to the R26r and 11 seconds quicker. Honda really do not have a hope in hells chance of achieving this , especially as the first of the modded Meganes is expected out next year as we could be seeing an RB model and i would hazard a guess at a Megane being first through the 8 minute barrier.
When you look at that Rs265 time you realise that its 2 seconds faster than an NSX-R,31 seconds faster than a standard NSX and 32 seconds faster than an S2000 and even more telling is 40 seconds faster than an Ep3. So you tell me how Honda expects to trump that in one fowl swoop, the scary thing is bar race cars Honda have never had any of their cars including sportscar and supercars beat it. so i think they should shut up now with the silly stories, develop the car then show us what it can do,