- Fifth victory for Gonzalez.Spaniard Manuel Gonzalez (Kalex) won the Moto2™ race at the 2026 Grand Prix of San Marino and the Rimini Riviera after starting fifth on the grid, finishing ahead of Dutch rider Collin Veijer and Belgian rider Barry Baltus, both also riding Kalex machinery. Every rider used the supersoft SCX at the rear, while most opted for the new F0749 development soft at the front. Some, however, including race winner Gonzalez, chose the standard soft SC1.
· Quiles wins with an SC2 gamble. The Moto3™ race featured a wide variety of tyre strategies, although most riders opted for the soft SC1 compound at both axles: 17 used it at the front and 22 at the rear. Demonstrating the high performance of the entire range available, Máximo Quiles (KTM) claimed his eighth victory of the season after starting fifth on the grid with the medium SC2 compound fitted at both ends, a combination chosen only by him and Cruces. The Spaniard beat pole-sitter David Almansa (KTM) with a decisive move at the final corner, after Almansa had led the race using soft SC1 tyres at both ends. Brian Uriarte, meanwhile, adopted a different strategy to finish third, pairing a medium SC2 front with a soft SC1 rear.
· Faster races and new lap records: This year’s Moto2™ and Moto3™ races were both around six seconds faster than their 2025 counterparts, with an average improvement of approximately three tenths per lap. New race lap records were also set in both classes: in Moto2™, Filip Salač (Kalex) set a new race lap record of 1’34.666 on lap seven, improving by one tenth on Gonzalez’s 2025 benchmark of 1’34.759. In Moto3™, race winner Quiles set a new race lap record of 1’40.366, also one tenth faster than Valentin Perrone’s 1’40.463 from last year.
Strong performance across the range and encouraging feedback on new developments
“The Grand Prix of San Marino and the Rimini Riviera was extremely positive for Pirelli, not only because of the lap records and the improvements in overall race times, but above all because it once again demonstrated that our entire range is both competitive and highly versatile.
In Moto2™, both front options – the standard tyre and the new F0749 development specification – delivered strong performances. Gonzalez won and Salač set the new race lap record on the standard product, while the new specification, which made its race debut, was the most popular choice and secured podium finishes with Veijer and Baltus.
We saw similar results in Moto3™, where every available tyre combination was used and all performed extremely well. This applied both to the medium SC2 used by Quiles at both the front and rear in his race-winning performance, and to the SC1 chosen by Almansa, who led the race until the final corner.
Providing several equally competitive solutions is one of the main objectives of our work. The results achieved at Misano confirm not only the strong performance of our standard compounds, but also the potential of the new specifications under development, which have continued to receive very positive feedback from riders and teams since their first outings”.
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