Ducati Lenovo Team manager Davide Tardozzi has credited MotoGP for the progress Pirelli has made with its WorldSBK tyres in recent years.

More specifically, Tardozzi thinks that Pirelli’s switch from WorldSBK to MotoGP – which will happen next year and was confirmed in 2025 – has led it to push harder in the development of its tyres for the production derivative series, which has seen lap records and race times fall dramatically in the past season or two as Pirelli has sought to increase both the outright performance of its tyres as well as their consistency over race distance.

“I am sure that the progress that has been made in the Superbike World Championship over the past year and a half has to do with the work Pirelli is doing for MotoGP,” Tardozzi said in an interview with Speedweek. 

“In the past, the Pirelli tyres degraded towards the end of the race, but that's no longer the case. 

“That's because they think they need it for MotoGP. Because even if the displacement is reduced, the motorcycles will have more power and less weight than a superbike. 

“This means more stress on the tyres. 

“Pirelli is thinking about this – and they are already showing that they are doing something.

“In some races in 2025, Toprak Razgatlioglu and Nicolo Bulega were 20 sec faster than the year before – that's not from the bike or the rider, it's the tyres.”

Pirelli has already conducted its first MotoGP tests in 2025 and private testing has been carried out by manufacturers since the end of last year. Official 850cc tests are due to take place later in 2026 in Czechia and then Austria.