Honda has long been known for high-revving engines since their GP racing days in the '60s when their 5 cylinder 125 turned 22,000 and the 297cc inline 6 made 55 hp at 17,500. When Soichiro went into racing and attended their first IOM, he realized that they could not compete by doing what most of the others were doing - long stroke engines with a wide powerband, so they set out to design piston rings that would withstand ridiculous rpm ranges and went gear driven DOHC, multi-valve, big bore, short stroke to move as much into and out of the engine as possible using BMEP calculations