Kawasaki ZX-10R Special ‘Winter Edition’


Kawasaki revealed their all-new ZX-10R superbike four weeks ago, but unveiled a superb-looking Winter Edition, jointly developed with the Kawasaki Racing Team, at the Milan show. The new edition gets the team’s svelte black and white testing livery, including the KRT ‘Snowflake’ logo and Japanese kanji ‘fuyu’ character, which means ‘Winter’. The special edition model also comes with a road-legal Akrapovic silencer as standard.

While the new ZX-10R may outwardly look pretty similar to the outgoing model, there’s a raft of changes to the engine, chassis, suspension, fairing, electronics, brakes and exhaust. The new 200 bhp is, the closest thing to a factory superbike it has ever produced.


The engine gets an a completely new cylinderhead and crank that has lost 20% of its mass, allowing the engine to spin-up faster thanks to less inertia, leading to stronger acceleration, faster deceleration and a reduction in gyroscopic effect that will help with cornering.

The new cylinderhead was designed with feedback from the WSB team and feature redesigned intake and exit ports, larger diameter exhaust valves with all valves now made from titanium, larger coolant passageways, and revised cam profiles for great valve overlap. The pistons are shorter and lighter, and the airbox is now two litres larger while the ramair intake has been moved further forward for greater efficiency.


New titanium header pipes are matched to those of the racing bike, and the larger silencer is now titanium not stainless steel and is lighter too. The chassis changes aren’t as extensive as the engine’s, but the head tube mounting is now 7.5 mm nearer the rider and helps to place more weight over the front wheel for better stability and turn in. It also gets the latest electronic control systems based around the Bosch Inertial Measurement Unit (IMU), which calculates its assistance based on lean angle, pitch and yaw, plus acceleration and braking. It also boasts Sport-Kawasaki TRaction Control (S-KTRC), Kawasaki Launch Control Mode (KLCM), Kawasaki Intelligent anti-lock Brake System (KIBS), Kawasaki Quick Shifter (KQS), Kawasaki Engine Brake Control (KEBC). The bike also has an Öhlins electronic steering damper and a new power mode selection.

The new front suspension sees the arrival of Showa’s Balance Free Front Fork and Balance Free Rear Cushion (BFRC) shock, but no semi-active assistance. Braking comes from Brembo’s top-of-the-range M50 cast aluminium and radially-mounted calipers and 330 mm twin discs.


While the new bike doesn’t look radically different to the old, Kawasaki say they largely, and deliberately left the aesthetics alone to concentrate on the bike’s performance, the proof of their endeavours will be in the riding.