Yamaha R125 and R3 2017 illustration appears and is a stunner

Yamaha R125 and R3 2017 illustration appears and is a stunner.

Check out this damned-fine illustration made by the chaps over at moto-blast.org.

They say that this is what the R15 could end up looking like when it’s given some styling tweaks ahead of being released as part of the 2017 line-up from Yamaha – but what’s a nice little aside is that, if this is indeed what the bike ends up looking like, not only will this motorcycle be the R15, it’ll be what the firm’s super-sporty R300/R25 is going to look like.

We’ve been telling you since last year that the Yamaha is getting a sporty makeover so that it can compete with the upcoming Honda CBR250RR (which we brought you the first look at the video of last week – you can see that HERE), the Ninja 300, the TVS/BMW S300RR and the Suzuki GSX-R250.

We have been told by factory insiders that the R3 will be based around the same styling as the smaller bike but will get more power and upgraded performance parts in order to compete for the sporty, quarter-litre (and a bit) sector.

What we do know is that all the R family is going to get cosmetic updates to make the family-line between the smaller bikes and the R1 and R1-M even closer. So there’s a very real chance that this mac-up by moto-blast is pretty much spot-on.

But for now, this is just an illustration – so we wanted to show you it. Mostly because we think this looks pretty kick-ass.