Prepare for a Heart-Pumping Ride with the Honda Civic Type R 2018

Should we change Honda Civic's Type R to Type H, instead? We seriously think so. "Honda's heart-pumping hatch is as hot and heavy as Hades himself" can be an easy and peculiar sentence for an introduction, but you can see there are many creative ways to whet your appetite for this vehicle just by using the letter "H" alone.

If one letter can do that, then you can just imagine what happens when you see this car in action. But for now, we can only wait and see. Honda's long-anticipated hatch will debut its production version at the Geneva Motor show next month, and by the looks of it, we don't expect it to be anything less than blazing hot. That said, the production version would be quite similar to the prototype, so you're almost seeing the actual image of the Type R when it's mass-produced worldwide.

Honda hasn't revealed a lot of details yet, but we expect that the Type R will be a reworked version of its predecessor, which has a 2.0 turbo four that churns 250KW hp and 450Nm of torque. The design will be based on the newest Civic hatchback, which grew some winged-carbon fiber splitter highlighted with a red accent line, diamond-mesh air intakes, red 'H' badge placed above a new air vent at the nose of the car, slatted ducts, and smoked LED headlights.

This car is expected to be offered exclusively with a six-speed manual transmission. Honda experts forecast that it can go from 0-100km/h within a five-second sweep. The current Type R does that in 5.7 seconds, with a top speed at 270km/h. And just by the looks of it, the the top speed of the 2018 Honda Type R will be a tad bit higher than that -- around 306bhp, which is closer to the range of Ford Focus RS.

This is also the first time that Honda is using a fully independent suspension for Type R, so expect the ride to be better in quality and handling. It will also remain a front-wheel-drive (FWD), making it more powerful than Volkswagen Golf R and a bit tamer than Ford Focus RS and Audi RS3.

And speaking of FWD, rumors are swirling that this version is attempting to set a new front-wheel drive Nurburgring record. Honda, however, remains tight-lipped about it. Their only statement about this was: “..we’ll be benchmarking our cars in the usual way”, which is almost as vague as a celebrity couple denying they're in a relationship of sorts. Yet despite this, we’re not going to be surprised if Honda will turn this ambitious attempt into reality. The 2018 Type R's more developed chassis, higher power, and  newer, more effective aero kit aren't something to mess around with.

Stephen Collins, Honda Australia's director, hinted that the price of this extremely good-looking car will be at around the $50,000 bracket in Australia. So it's like you're buying something in between a Volkswagen Golf GTI and a Golf R. He also added that he has nothing but high hopes for Civic's newest Type R, and Honda's focus is to offer the best hatchback in the market today.

“There’s huge interest among enthusiasts who know Type R, we expect that to gain momentum…there are definitely the die-hards who had or wanted to have a Type R previously, but then there’s also the conquest-type buyers who just want the hottest hatch in the market, and it’s our goal to deliver that,” Collins stated.

The Honda Civic Type R is the highest performance version of the Honda Civic. Initially conceived to run on racetracks, the increased market demand for its highly-regarded VTEC engines encouraged the company to design it for a much wider market. Currently, it's only sold in Hong Kong (with a delivery time of 4 months) and Malaysia (RM299,999.00) for Asian countries.