Fight club! Royal Enfield’s new Guerrilla 450 is a road-biased Himalayan sibling

Royal Enfield are preparing to launch a new roadster model next month, with much of its architecture borrowed from the existing Himalayan 450. 

Taking to social media, the Indian brand have teased fans with the new machine, even recruiting former road racer and TV personality Guy Martin to show off the new bike’s dynamic abilities in a video posted to their channel. 

More information will be revealed at the bike’s launch in Barcelona this July 17, but for now all that is confirmed is that it will be called the Guerrilla 450 – seemingly indicating that it will share the same liquid-cooled 452cc single-cylinder ‘Sherpa’ engine fitted to the current Himalayan 450. 

Speaking to MCN at last year’s Eicma trade show in Milan, Royal Enfield’s Mark Wells said: “[The Sherpa engine] is genuinely class-leading, and I don’t think there’s an engine anywhere in the class that’s doing what this does,” Wells said. “It would be foolish of us not to think about what else this engine… [could feature in].” 

Eye on the numbers 

Power and torque are likely to be very similar to the 40bhp and 29.5 lb.ft on tap with the Himalayan – unless the air box design is radically different, therefore positioning the Guerrilla squarely within the uber popular A2 roadster class.  

The engine cases seem to confirm this suspicion, as does the large radiator positioned upfront which appears identical to the one used to cool the Himmy. Even the centre stand and chrome centrally mounted horn appears identical. 

The exhaust appears alike too, even to the point of sharing the same routing and although the chassis cannot be clearly seen in pictures released so far, we’d wager it’s a similar, if not the same twin spar tubular steel affair as used elsewhere by Enfield.  

The subframe, pillion footrest hangers and even the swing arm could well be borrowed from the 450 Himalayan by the looks of things too, although suspension travel is likely to be less than the 200mm available on Enfield’s resident adventure bike. A single round dash (likely TFT) – you guessed it – just like the Himalayan’s is all that is on hand to display information. 

What’s new 

Whilst the bike clearly isn’t a ground up creation, there are differences that stand it apart from its continent crossing sibling, however. 

In true roadster fashion, wheels look to be 17-inch cast units at both ends, and a pair of short travel conventional telescopic forks take care of suspension duties up front.  

Body work, bar the swooping black tank, is non-existent to offer a more minimalist experience and it seems that ultimately, Royal Enfield have repeated what they did to create the 411 Scram again, but gone further this time by altering the suspension and trying a more road orientated wheel setup. 

Strong competition 

With the huge success of Triumph’s Speed 400 and Scrambler 400 models, which this new bike goes up against, it’s no wonder Royal Enfield are vying for a slice of the A2 roadster pie. 

For reference, both aforementioned Triumphs have maintained best-selling position in both Modern Classic and 126-500cc sales brackets every single month of 2024 according to figures published by the Motorcycle Industry Association. 

Price is yet to be announced, but it’ll have to be competitive against the £4995 Speed 400 to be in with a chance of claiming the A2 crown.