Honda just announced it has big, big plans for SEMA 2015. Yeah, there will be Civics and HR-Vs there but what caught our eye is the Ridgeline Desert Race Truck, a concept said to give a glimpse at the 2017 Ridgeline and announce Honda's return to factory off-road racing. Those are two pretty big bombshells to drop. The folks over at Honda Performance Development (HPD) will be behind the concept Ridgeline, which gives us hope that it will be more than just a Honda Pilot with a bed.

While we were never big fans of the Ridgeline we are excited to see what the 2017 model could look like. The fact that this concept is racing inspired gives us hope that the production version will also have an HPD variant available. Doing something as bonkers as the Ford Raptor may be out of the question but what about models like the Toyota Tacoma TRD Sport or the Nissan Frontier Desert Runner? Honda seems to be moving in the direction of "fun" as of recently which is a welcome change. The Civic Type R is headed to the United States soon and the new Civic both looks good and packs a turbo! We're glad there's renewed focus on the Ridgeline but please, Honda, try a bit harder this time.