The Honda CRX Si Is the Antidote to Modern Bloat

“I first drove a friend’s non-Si CRX at an autocross in 1984,” recalls fabled Honda racer Peter Cunningham. “It was so good. It had great handling and balance and a good power-to-weight ratio. So, on June 28, 1986, I leased a CRX Si for four years. And when I wasn’t racing it, I was using it to tow my other race car.”

This story originally appeared in Volume 12 of Road & Track.

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In the early Eighties, most new cars had carburetors. In 1980, the only Ferraris the factory sent to America were the 308 and the Mondial, both powered by a carbureted 3.0-liter V-8 with 205 hp. The Toyota Corolla was rear drive with a solid axle through 1983. Chevrolet sold the antediluvian Chevette until 1987, and the 1981 Ford Mustang’s only V-8 was a 4.2-liter rated at 115 hp. The Germans? VW’s GTI didn’t make it here until 1984, and from 1982 through 1985, the only way to buy a mid-size Mercedes-Benz (the now-beloved W123) was with a diesel engine. The two-seat CRX Si looked like half a hard-boiled egg, never generated huge performance numbers, and didn’t sell in enormous quantities, but it was the vanguard of every coming good thing.

This 1985 example is, literally, a museum piece. American Honda delivered it to us to drive in Santa Barbara, California, so we could reminisce on the prescience of what is now a time capsule. It’s likely as well preserved as any first-year CRX Si there is. Showing barely over 10,000 miles on the odometer, it’s spooky stock. Thirteen-inch aluminum wheels inside cheap P175/70R-13 tires. No stupid Maxwell House exhaust tip or gnarled suspension pieces. A survivor that has slalomed around bad mods for 37 years.

Some redecoration separated the Si from the lowly versions of the CRX (for example, a trick sunroof that rolled back atop the roof), but what mattered was the fuel-injection system.

Honda built its own electronic fuel injection for the Si and paired it with a new tuned-runner intake manifold. Honda’s Programmed Fuel Injection (PGM-FI) was first used on the company’s CX500 and CX650 Turbo two-cylinder motorcycles, where its precise fuel metering civilized the turbo installation for on-road manners. Using sophisticated piezoelectric sensors and some computer logic, it bumped output of the CRX’s SOHC 12-valve 1.5-liter four from 74 hp with a carb to a full 91. Those small numbers figure out to a 23 percent increase in output. For a car that cost as little as the CRX Si—$7999 to start, or about $22,000 in current dollars—injection was advanced tech.

“Little,” though, is relative—that price was over $1000 higher than the carbureted base CRX.“Little” is also an absolute term. Approach the CRX now and it seems impossibly dinky. Ford sells the 2022 F-150 in five wheelbases, three of which are lengthier than the CRX is long overall. At 1840 pounds, the CRX Si weighs in more than half a ton (1121 pounds) lighter than the 2022 Civic Si sedan with summer tires. If you could stack the min through the hatch, that’s four Aaron Donalds plus a pound of jerky.