#colors of…

[uwabbittuwabbit]

Colors of…the Repsol Honda Team

At the announcement that every team is dropping a vintage livery come Silverstone, I am taking it upon myself to dig into the history of each team’s liveries. We shall start with Repsol Honda, the much storied, and nowadays much troubled manufacturer. The HRC official colors of red, white and blue purportedly represent passion (red), purity (white) and calm (blue), qualities that can be ascribed to winning riders, to paraphrase. In fact, the origin of these colors is much simpler: the colors debuted on the bike of one Morio Sumiya, who participated in the 24 Hours of Le Mans representing Honda. Little imagination is required then, to conclude as to why these colors were used.

Repsol’s current brand image is the work of the Wolff Olins consultation, only slightly altered in the passage of time. The change was brought on by the corporatization of Repsol, which as such needed something more commercially recognizable—an R encased in concentric circles just wouldn’t do anymore. The result is the orange and red sun motif with the white strike-through, which embody such ideas like that of “energy”, “professionalism”, “stability”, “strength” etc. Take of that what you will.

Nebulous brand concepts aside, what can be said definitively is that the bikes of the Repsol Honda team have become cornerstones of the grid, easily identifiable in their trademark orange (fun fact: they were the first team to paint the inside of their tires). Seeing as the Repsol partnership is due to end after this season, this may not be the case in the future. But we are concerned about the prospects of the past, so let’s round it up:

500cc Era Liveries

Pre Repsol

Not much explaining needed on my part because these are liveries that largely feature the HRC colors with a few other accents. This was probably their most experimental era as evidenced by the variation presented below:

From left to right, top down: Freddie Spencer circa 1983, Wayne Gardner circa 1990, Mick Doohan circa 1994, Wayne Gardner circa 1980 (exact date not sure)

Post Repsol

Back when Honda first partnered with Repsol their newly minted logo was in its first iteration, featuring a kind of teal color and some additional “speed” lines added on the bottom of the sun. All of Mick Doohan’s championship wins from 1995 onwards would be with some variation of the giant Repsol sun stamped on the side of his bike, the teal color permeating the rest of the cladding in an evocation of the sky. His last season in MotoGP would be spent with this livery too.

Top to bottom, left to right: Mick Doohan 1995, 1996, 1997, 1998

Honorable mention goes to Valentino Rossi’s Nastro Azzurro Honda! He wasn’t in Repsol Honda yet but I feel it would be remiss not to mention and certainly not hard to miss, considering that shade of yellow…

Valentino Rossi, 2000 and 2001

A special shoutout to the 2001 Hawaiian print bike!

MotoGP Era

For all of Valentino’s short tenure at Repsol Honda, he sure had as much fun as he could. Two championships aside, this did not apply equally to the livery—unfortunately, it should be seen at this point that the team already had a penchant for the same old thing.

Valentino Rossi 2002 and 2003

2003, running a special livery farewelling Honda

Honda would continue their successes with a retinue of talented riders, the likes of Nicky Hayden, Dani Pedrosa, Andrea Dovizioso, Casey Stoner and Marc Marquez all donning Repsol orange. Unlike their prodigies the livery had largely calcified into a fixed form, which saw no substantial changes in appearance aside from a scant few special livery runs. Iconic or not? Certainly for some it is not a sight for sore eyes.

Top to bottom, left to right: Nicky Hayden 2007, Dani Pedrosa 2008, Casey Stoner 2011, Andrea Dovizioso 2011, Marc Marquez 2019

Bonus: Mom I’m a star! Dani Pedrosa and Casey Stoner share the podium, Aragón 2011

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Sources: On Honda // On Repsol (1) // On Repsol (2)

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Location: San Francisco, California