Kawasaki has secured the 2026 WorldSPB Manufacturers’ Title at the EICMA Italian Round, becoming the first manufacturer to win the crown in the category’s debut season. The team clinched it in Race 1, finishing with 282 points and a 79-point lead over Triumph with three rounds still left on the calendar.
Four riders built that tally across the season: Team ProDina Kawasaki XCI’s David Salvador and Antonio Torres, and MTM Kawasaki’s Loris Veneman and Xavi Artigas. Salvador has carried the bulk of it, leading the Riders’ Championship with Artigas close behind, while Torres and Veneman added points of their own throughout the year.
Wrapping up the title with three rounds still on the calendar says something about the margin Kawasaki built early. A 79-point cushion over Triumph, the closest manufacturer in the standings, is the kind of lead that turns the season’s final rounds into a formality for the title itself, even with plenty still on the line individually for Salvador and Artigas.
Kawasaki’s WorldSPB Manufacturers’ Title Completes a Sweep Across Every Production Class
Kawasaki now holds manufacturer titles across WorldSBK, WorldSSP, WorldSSP300 and WorldSPB — every rung of the FIM’s production-based racing ladder. SBI covered this category’s 2026 debut when it replaced WorldSSP300 as the sport’s new entry point.
Kawasaki had already won five WorldSSP300 rider titles and seven manufacturer titles in that class, so staying committed through the changeover was a continuation of a program that was already working, not a fresh bet on an unproven category. WorldSPB itself was built as a bridge toward the World Supersport ranks, a stated purpose that gives this season’s results a second meaning beyond the manufacturer standings.
2026 WorldSPB Manufacturers’ Title: Kawasaki Bet the Class on the Ninja ZX-6R 636, and It Paid Off
Kawasaki moved its WorldSPB entry from the Ninja 400 to the Ninja ZX-6R 636 at the start of the category, a switch Shigemi Tanaka, managing director of Kawasaki Motors Europe, called a deliberate break from resting on past results. The decision showed up all season in fastest laps, pole positions and race wins across the Kawasaki-mounted field.
Back-office and technical support scaled up with the bike change too. Tanaka pointed to a shared setup process across every Kawasaki team and rider on the grid, information moving freely instead of staying inside one garage, as a real factor behind the season, not just the hardware itself.
“This title is as much theirs as ours,” Tanaka said of the riders who built the campaign.
The clearest proof of that design showed up in the rider’s seat. Salvador’s WorldSPB title run earns him a step up to the Puccetti Kawasaki World Supersport squad for 2027 — the progression the category was built to produce, and the real measure of whether a manufacturer title outlasts the season that won it.
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