Honda Is Building A Racier Civic Type R For The U.S.

Toyota has the new, rear-seat-less GRMN Corolla, Hyundai has its big-winged Elantra N TCR, and soon Honda will be bringing an even nuttier version of its Civic Type R to the party. On Friday, Honda confirmed that a Honda Racing Corporation version of its high-performance hatchback "is in development for the U.S. market." Translation: Honda is working on an even racier Civic Type R to sell in America. The company first showed off that HRC Concept at the Tokyo Auto Salon back in January, but it landed in North America for the first time at the SEMA Show in Las Vegas last week.

Not much is known about the HRC Civic, but judging from the red-and-purple-camo'd Concept, expect it to get more aggressive aero parts and cooling. If we had to guess based on how this sort of thing tends to go, we'd put our money on different, lighter wheels, stickier tires, tweaked suspension parts, some chassis stiffening, and maybe a modest power bump. Although we also wouldn't be that surprised if it doesn't come with any more power than the 315-hp standard model.

Honda says the CTR HRC is being made in the name of "ultimate pure sports performance" using HRC tech and racing driver expertise. A more extreme driving experience, then, is a given, but those specific words also read to us as "less compromising as a daily driver." Not unexpected or entirely a bad thing, given the premise, but probably not the Type R to get if you plan to, say, daily it year-round.

In any case, the HRC Concept CTR isn't the only car at Honda's SEMA stand this year, as it's joined by a Passport Baja trophy truck, a Passport TrailSport Baja Chase support vehicle, a Prelude modified by Hasport, and a handful of the automaker's race cars, including this year's Aston Martin AMR26 Formula 1 car, which uses a Honda RA626H power unit. Hopefully, the pumped-up Civic Type R that'll eventually hit U.S. showrooms will be a lot more competitive than that Aston.