The team at Dunlop have a brand new hypersport tyre on the market this year, the SportSmart Mk3, which they recently launched to the world’s press in Barcelona.
Attendees were given the chance to test it on a 100-mile road loop, before heading to the Parc Motor circuit to the north of the city for three 20 minute track sessions and a figure-of-eight wet handling test.
This latest Dunlop employs a Rayon based carcass, which promotes more even heat distribution across the tyre when compared with nylon or Kevlar, making for more even wear during the life of the tyre. They tyre maker has also moved away from a triple JointLess Belt construction to a single cord, which has helped engineers to fine tune the contact patch for better feel through the bars for the rider.
A huge array of bikes were made available to journalists, including BMW’s S1000RR and F800GT for the road section, and the Kawasaki Z900 and ZX-636R for the track.
After the road portion of the test, MCN’s Michael Neeves commented:
“Ride quality is on the firm side of plush, but they warm up fast and that’s what you really want when you’re out in everyday, stop/start conditions, where it’s hard to keep heat in your tyres, especially in the cold.
They’re stable and above all, have enough grip to handle anything you can throw at them for spirited riding, even around the wet weather test track set up for us.”
You can read Michael’s full review here.
Fast Bikes editor Bruce Wilson was also in attendance, and despite finding the limits of the rear tyre when pushing hard on track, he was also full of praise in their June 2019 issue:
“Having got all hot and flustered, the last test was to blitz around a wet handling course and perform an emergency stop. It was a nice gesture, but not overly telling of how good or bad the rubber would actually cope when faced with drenched B-roads. Needless to say, I didn’t stack it, and if the claims for the tyre live up to their name, I’ve no doubt the heavily treaded Dunlops will do fine and dandy in the rain… but that’s a test for another day. What I can tell you is that these tyres genuinely impressed me,proving to be great on the road, decent on track and harder wearing than a fossilised lump of cheese.
If you’re in search of tyres that’ll keep going longer than the Duracell Bunny, designed for all conditions and just about every bike, you’d be daft to overlook these.”
The new SportSmart Mk3 range is already in our warehouse, ready to ship to trade customers!
You can view the full range of sizes here.
