For decades, Harley-Davidson has fostered a reputation for being one of the first stops for the rider who wants to ride a La-Z-Boy down the highway. Aside from curiosities like the Pan America and the spun-off LiveWire brand, you have to look elsewhere if you want a Harley that isn’t a cruiser. But the Motor Company recently teased a future where, maybe, it could try something different again. This is the Harley-Davidson RMCR concept, and it’s a stunning café racer from the last brand you’d expect to do such a thing. Now, Harley just needs to put it into production.
Back in 2021, Harley-Davidson launched a production engine with incredible potential. The all-new clean sheet 1250 Revolution Max, or “Revmax” V-twin engine, was a technological leap forward for the Motor Company. This engine has a peak RPM of 9,500, dual counterbalancers, variable valve timing, scissors gear primary drive, independent hydraulic adjustment for the roller-finger valves, and an impressive amount of weight reduction.
There’s more, as the Revmax sports single-piece aluminum cylinders with nickel silicon carbide-surface galvanic coatings, forged pistons, plus rocker covers, camshaft covers, and a primary cover made of magnesium. I’m still not done with this engine yet, as the Revmax’s crankshaft connecting rod journals are offset by 30 degrees, and it has a 90-degree firing order.
At 150 horsepower and 94 lb-ft of torque, Harley’s Revmax even made more power than the Indian, BMW, and Triumph engines that Harley was angling to beat. The company then pointed out that it did all this in-house without help from Porsche — as it did with the V-Rod’s engine — or anyone else.
Unfortunately, Harley did all of this work, but hasn’t really let the engine live up to its full potential. As of present, the Revmax lives in the excellent Pan America 1250 adventure-touring bike and the beefy Sportster S muscle bike, while a smaller version inhabits the Nightster cruiser. All of these bikes are well-reviewed and largely beloved by their owners, but it seems that Harley-Davidson hasn’t yet found the apex of this engine. Well, that was until now.
Sporty Harleys
Harley-Davidson has frequently flirted with the idea of having sporty motorcycles behind its shield. Any fan of American two-wheelers might be able to recall Buell’s old relationship with Harley-Davidson. Then there was the time when Harley acquired MV Agusta in 2008, just to blow it up in 2009 during the global recession.
Even those times aside, Harley-Davidson built the XR1200 street tracker-inspired Sportster from 2008 to 2013. In the past, there was also the VR1000 superbike of the 1990s and the Harley-Davidson XLCR 1000 café racer of the late 1970s.
Many of these efforts eventually failed or were discontinued, but Harley has never really forgotten about them. Back in 2018, Harley-Davidson CEO Matt Levatich championed the “More Roads to Harley-Davidson” that, among other things, sought to breathe fresh life into Harley by entering motorcycle markets it traditionally didn’t operate in. More Roads was ambitious and called for a future where Harley’s bread and butter big cruisers would be joined by a vivid lineup of café racers, sportbikes, streetfighters, adventure bikes, mopeds, electric motorcycles, and standards.
We caught a glimpse into that future with concepts like the Bronx, the VR1000 Café Racer, the Custom 1250, the Pan America, the electric scrambler, the light electric dirt bike, and more.
Unfortunately, when Jochen Zeitz replaced Levatich in 2020, he scrapped pretty much the entire initiative, keeping only the projects that were near completion. That’s why we have the Pan America, LiveWire, and the Sportster S. Zeitz was so serious about canning More Roads that, as I personally witnessed, Harley-Davidson even deleted social media posts associated with the initiative.
Harley Teases America With A Café Racer
Zeitz’s plan was to play the hits and keep slinging big cruisers while pushing t-shirts and other merch. He also wanted to build fewer bikes at high prices to make them feel more exclusive. As Cycle World notes, this worked for a couple of years as income stayed high while tens of thousands of units sat unsold. Zeitz’s strategy eventually backfired as both income and sales spiraled. In 2025, Zeitz left his post and was replaced by Artie Starrs. Now, Starrs is an interesting character because his previous roles weren’t with motorcycle companies, but with Topgolf, Pizza Hut, and Rave Cinemas.
It also seems like Starrs doesn’t believe in turning Harley-Davidson into the Ferrari of motorcycles. So, his version of Harley-Davidson has changed course on a few things. As ADV Rider claims, Zeitz allegedly rarely communicated with dealers, rarely attended dealer meetings, and supposedly issued orders without much consultation. So Starrs changed that right away by asking dealers what did and didn’t work in the Zeitz era.
Then he tackled pricing. 17 Harley models entered 2026 with the same names they had in 2025. Of those 17, six models had their prices reduced through the reconfiguration of options. I’m not talking by hundreds of dollars, either, but by thousands of dollars. Only two models saw price increases this year. The rest of the nine returning models stayed the course on price. Allegedly, Starrs is even trying to convince people to buy the Pan America, something that Harley did a poor job with during the Zeitz era.
Now, we’re seeing what could be a promising future. In February at the Mama Tried Motorcycle Show, Harley-Davidson teased the RMCR (Revolution Max Café Racer). In March, images of the RMCR finally made it to the press, and it’s a stunner.
This bike, which reportedly rides on the Pan America 1250’s platform and sports the 1252cc Revolution Max V-twin, takes much of its inspiration from the XLCR. As the story goes, famed designer and third-generation Davidson family member Willie G. Davidson had a knack for the café racers that frequented the London biker hangout, the Ace Café. In several decades past, Brits stripped down their BSAs, Nortons, Triumphs, and others down to the bare minimum, attached low bars, and raced from café to café. In the 1970s, people started giving Japanese bikes the café racer treatment, too.
In the mid-1970s, Davidson started tinkering on his own Harley café racer, which later became a whole company team effort. When the XLCR hit the market in 1977, it wasn’t just the coolest Harley built until that point, but it was just as fast as it looked.
Sadly, Harley’s typical clientele didn’t bite on the $3,600 XLCR, and neither did the guys chopping up Japanese bikes. Harley moved barely over 3,000 units over only three model years. The XLCR might have been a flop when it came to sales, but today, it’s highly collectible and often used as an example that Harley really can build more than just cruisers. Cycle World said, “As a motorcycle, the XLCR has not much merit. As an adventure, the XLCR has no equal.”
That brings us to the RMCR. This motorcycle, which Harley-Davidson says is inspired by the XLCR, pretty much replaces the Bronx concept that was canned with More Roads. But it also seems to take some inspiration from the More Roads concepts that Harley decided not to produce. The RMCR’s fairing looks like the one from the VR1000 Café Racer concept, and the swingarm looks awfully similar to the one on the Bronx.
This new concept is drenched in carbon fiber, sings from Akrapovic pipes, sports 17-inch wheels, rides on Öhlins forks, and has its dinner plates of brakes chomped on by Brembo calipers. I suspect it probably weighs a good deal less than the 542-pound Pan America that it’s based on.
This is easily one of the best-looking bikes to come out of the Motor Company in years. I won’t go as far as to say it’s as hot as an Indian FTR1200, but it sure feels like I’m sweating right now just looking at this thing.
Unfortunately, Harley-Davidson is being weirdly quiet about the RMCR. It was rolled out without any announcements, press releases, or anything like that. Motor Cycle News says that Harley has confirmed to it that it currently has no plans to put the RMCR into production.
Harley Should Build It, Anyway
Of course, that could change depending on how people respond. Then again, now would be a tricky time for Harley to try jumping into another market, given trade tensions, global conflicts, and the current uncertainty around oil prices.
But it would be sad that Harley would put in so much work to make an awesome motorcycle just to do nothing with it. We don’t need a repeat of the More Roads bloodbath! If anything, I do think that this bike is a sign that Starrs does want to have fun with the Bar and Shield, and that makes me excited.
I sure hope that, one day, when things get a bit easier, Harley-Davidson takes a chance and puts the RMCR into production. This is easily the coolest-looking machine to roll out of Milwaukee in years. I have no idea if it would have a chance of selling, but I bet I’d ride it with a smile wide enough to span Lake Michigan.
Top graphic image: Harley-Davidson
The Revolution Max is a great engine but I’m not really into the adventure style of the Pan America, so I’m excited to see it (potentially) in cafe racer clothing. This won’t be a volume seller for Harley, but if they price it right it has the potential to bring in some buyers that would normally shop other brands like Triumph and Ducati.
I think that Harley has put itself in a bad place, but I am not someone to write off the brand. I like Harleys but I have never owned one because they are usually bad value compared to a Japanese bike, and I have never wanted a cruiser. I have ridden a few Road Kings, and I like them, might consider one someday, but this would be more exciting, or those deeply depreciated Pan Americas that Mercedes wrote about yesterday.
It looks like it’s on stilts.
I kinda want to see the exhaust under the bike like a Buell.
I like this. Might be a good Super Hooligans bike. But I don’t see it working with the biker bar crowd, and that’s where Harley makes its money. Most of them are my age now anyway, and I’m Millenial.
Harley has pigeonholed their brand so much that, despite all the work that went into developing such a product, people in the market for a cafe racer are simply not stepping into one of their dealerships.
Harley’s brand identity is permanently attached at the hip to the hog culture. And while I understand the need to break into other categories to grow the company, doing it under the namesake Harley Davidson brand is a setup for failure.
The other problem is that even if they created a whole new sub-brand or sister brand for more lively, sporting bikes such as this new one, they need to be sold OUTSIDE of the traditional HD dealer network. This is clearly their Sisyphean mountain to clear!
HD can’t tease anyone, because people have to want something to be teased by it. On the other hand, any one of us can walk into their dealer and tease their sales people.
HD sucked since they killed Buell, it was a big deal and shouldn’t be glossed over. That was when harely died, it just took a while to bleed out. They went from bad ass biker dudes, to a company scared of the future and we know how people react to fear…
I’m not into Harleys but it’s decent looking. Would a dentist ride it I suppose so they could probably sell it.
I’m not a Harley guy. Years ago, my neighbor had a Sportster and I had a Suzuki VStrom 1000. We swapped bikes and when we got back after about a five-mile ride, he wondered out loud how much a used one would be. I don’t remember exactly which year and spec his Sportster was, but I liked my bike a lot better. And the VStrom was not the favorite of the five bikes I’ve owned.
I like the looks of your “new” Pan America and I’ll look forward to your full review. But this thing? No. Just no. A cafe racer is probably my least favorite form factor of any bike except a cruiser with ape hangers.
Harley is facing an existential time bomb of their own making; they’ve spent decades telling everyone that obsolete engines are actually “heritage” and that’s what they really sell. HD doesn’t sell motorcycles, they sell an image; they’ve crapped all over innovation for so long that the HD customer practically breaks out in hives if you mention liquid cooling or 90 degree twins. At the same time, they’ve made their brand synonymous with technical stagnation.
What you have is a group of HD customers who won’t buy a liquid cooled modern motorcycle (and I use the term “modern” very generously here), and a market at large that has no interest in a Harley when there are so many other bikes out there for less money that do more.
Motorcycle enthusiasts are not fooled by glossy brochures and silly claims like “more power than the BMW R1300GS!” – yeah, by 5 whole horsepower. Wooo, throw a parade. They also notice that HD leaves off other bikes like Ducati and KTM that beat their shiny new vibrator by 20 and 10 horsepower, respectively. Experienced riders also know there’s more to a bike than the engine, the Pan America is notorious for electrical problems and the new liquid cooled heads are not exactly “dialed in” yet with repeated reports of leaky systems. (Harley likes to call their bikes Knuckle-head, and Flat-head – should this one be the Shower Head?) Chassis tuning, weight, and where that weight is carried are all arguably more important than power; BMW might be down 5 hp on the Pan America, but it caries the weight so low that the bike is far easier to handle. We also haven’t forgotten the HD Dyna, which has a chassis made out of some kind of warm cheese and results in serious instability problems; or the bikes with floppy swingarms that result in control problems at speed.
All those promising bike programs mentioned that got canned? Harley finally had a CEO who was thinking ahead, looking at building smaller, affordable bikes to bring in younger, less experienced riders. He pushed for Harley to finally innovate – and his reward was to be pushed out and all his projects cancelled to make room for more 850# pig-iron baggers with slightly differently-shaped fenders. The only reason the Pan America exists right now is because it managed to make it to production before it could be killed in the crib.
The last time Harley tried to innovate they built the V-rod and it’s siblings around a Porsche-designed engine built by Rotax – and the bike was a commercial flop. No one bought it. Sure, we look back at it now as this great promising leap forward for HD, but it was still a financial boondoggle because people who buy Harleys didn’t want it, and everyone else didn’t want a Harley.
In 2025 Q4 Harley revenue totaled $496 million, down 28% from Q4 the previous year and an operating loss of $361 million – up from the operating loss of $193 million the previous year. Last year HD saw sales declines across the board, with US sales at -12,9%, Korea -18.4%, India -34.4%, China -28.4%, Japan -25.1%, Italy -34.5%, France – 48.5%, Germany -58.5% and Europe as a whole at -39.6%. While these numbers are probably worse than they would be due to retaliatory tariffs, Harley’s numbers have been sliding for over a decade due to an aging market and lower spending power from young riders who can’t afford a luxury item like a Harley or simply see better value in the competition; they aren’t falling for the same tired marketing line of “Ultra Super-Awesome Limited Rolling Thunder America F—Yeah Screamin’ Eagle Heritage Turd” nonsense that worked on their parents.
Perhaps they should offer a partnership for a Harley branded Ram with a Hemi.
They had that deal with Ford, which offered a Harley Davidson edition F-150
You may also like the Powerbrick Pan-American kit which is actually something you can buy technically.
Also looks pretty sick and along the same lines only with a modern look.
Reusing that headlight from the Pan-Am is not doing anyone favors, unless Tron is your huckleberry.
These aren’t remotely comparable but I’m still hung up on the Triumph Rocket 3. I want one so damn bad.
On topic, if there was a Harley I was going to ride, this would be it.
I don’t hate the look, but I don’t know who’d be shopping for one at a HD dealer.
And which Triumph were they benchmarking?
The Speed Triple, now a 1200cc, is 177hp/92ftlb.
It would counter their claim of “more power than” being that 150<177.
Probably the Thruxton 1200, I don’t think anyone would seriously cross shop with a Speed Triple. R9T competitor is more like it.
Wow, this seems like it’d make a great first bike. (iykyk)
Never been a Harley guy, but I like it.
Harley’s problem with these kinds of bikes is that in 4 years right when this bike might start getting a little traction in the marketplace, they’ll discontinue the bike and triple-down on cruisers for rich boomers.
You don’t typically get that kind of short-sightedness from other brands. When they enter a new segment, they really enter it. They might sponsor a race series, release multiple bikes in that segment, and just in general how it off everywhere.
HD needs to demonstrate some long term planning.
If they’d stuck with the Buell Blast as a loss-leader for a second generation, and then branded it as a genuine HD, I’d have way more respect.
But you’re likely right. No one will consider it, until it’s gone.
Welcome to the short sighted American quarterly report capitalism conundrum. If H/D could plan like Hyundai instead of GM they might survive. As a Milwaukee area guy I want them to succeed. But only building chrome cruisers ain’t gonna do it. If us old farts want a Buick dealer experience go to th HD. My plan would be to set up alternate showrooms for all the other bikes, serve espresso not Frappuccino, get racing and start restart the mods and rockers era.
Tell them you want to evaluate the engine, just the engine. Then stick it in Jason’s 2CV
Seeing a Harley with Akrapovic is weird.
I liked the Bronx concept since I’m in my naked bike phase. This looks like a less comfortable Bronx with a bullet fairing and a concept-bike diet. One would assume they’re gauging interest in the concept again, since they really need a win. Put a more comfortable seat on it and I’d definitely want to try one.
Remember when Harley-Davidson won the Grand Prix World Championship four times with the RR250 and RR350 ?
Yeah nobody does, but something like that would be cool.
For a company whose customers refer to their bikes by what the heads look like, that engine looks like a toaster. And not a cool toaster like a Dualit either. When did motorcycle engines get ugly?
This is a very cool looking bike. To me, it looks like an ICE version of the Livewire (particularly the tail, tank, seat, and front fender).
Just by looking at it I can tell the riding position wouldn’t work with my back (I sold my Livewire because I couldn’t ride it comfortably for more than 10 minutes at a time), but it looks like it would be very fun to ride. H-D is certainly capable of making new and interesting bikes, even if those bikes never seem to find their audience.
I’m not really into motorcycles, but dang: that thing is sex on wheels.
I’d really, really like to see Harley not suck. They’ve got amazing heritage, and clearly some great stylists and engineers, but management needs to stop treating it like a venture capital cash machine. It would be nice if dealers actually put in some effort selling novel new bikes, too.
Agree. One of HD’s big problems in my book was it made a faustian bargain – produce bikes that weren’t just retro, but basically copies of its heritage stuff. Sold really well in the short term, but once that demographic aged out, it was stuck with a reputation of being *that* motorcycle company b/c of how hard it went.
If it could offer new stuff with hints of the old, like Ford does with the Mustang, and of course get prices down/quality up, it could have a real chance. I’m rooting for it for sure.
BINGO! That’s completes my Harley Marketing Bullshit bingo card.
Just because they lean into the heritage stuff too hard doesn’t make it bullshit. HD has been around since 1903. Harleys have served in two world wars. At times they’ve been legit technological leaders – including recently with the Livewire.
My great grandfather was in the army of occupation in France following WW1. He got to spend a lot of time goofing off because he was given eight hours to make his rounds on horseback, but he found an abandoned Harley and could cover the beat in two hours.
The Livewire isn’t “industry leading” it wasn’t the first commercial motorcycle EV, and it’s no longer claimed under the HD brand – they spun it off because they didn’t want to dilute their badge and it wasn’t selling. It’s also more expensive than the competition while offering shorter legs.
The prototype was on display in the corner of one of the HD tents during Daytona Beach bike week. It looked awesome.
Was their a bunch of existing Harley owners standing around grumbling about it being a bike for 25 year old, easily offended, Millennials born in the 1980s?
That really works even with the odd tail section. I always liked the Indian FTR, and I might like this better?
Crazy to watch Harley do a bunch of the stuff Erik Buell wanted, but like three decades later.
That last pic does it for me – chain drive AND a cafe-icon hubcap? So unusually fun for HD.
Wasn’t the XR1200 dirt tracker-inspired, recalling (sadly kinda late but I’ll take it) its legendary XR750?
Being British, all I saw was a cup of tea, but maybe that’s appropriate for something based on bikes that raced between 1960s transport caffs?
The bike looks fantastic, BTW.
Ha – given the national origin of the style, you’re of course correct! To my American eyes, it looked like a coffee cup from the 1950s, HD’s mythical heyday.
Yeah, it’s pretty obvious the team got to enjoy themselves with that design.
I want it, like really want it, but with a smaller motor and for like $8k
I realized I don’t want a smaller motor in a motorcycle, I want a big lazy one.
I don’t want to be doing triple the posted limit at the end of an on-ramp, but I don’t want to have to think about downshifting if I plan to pass someone at highway speeds.
May I interest you in about two dozen different metric bikes that do exactly that? KTM, Ducati, BMW, Honda, Yamaha.. swing a cat, man. Harley isn’t even close to special.