Marco Bezzecchi
Valentino Rossi returned to the MotoGP paddock to watch his VR46 team at the Grand Prix of Qatar. It was another successful weekend for the satellite Ducati outfit.
VR46 have made a step up at Ducati in 2025 after Pramac left to join Yamaha. The team have inherited the third factory Desmosedici GP25, which Fabio Di Giannantonio is riding.
The Italian has been slowly recovering from a fractured collarbone sustained in pre-season. Di Giannantonio scored his first podium of 2025 in Austin with third as he is starting to reach top performance.
Diggia was excited to have Rossi in Qatar – the 26-year-old has learned a lot from the seven-time MotoGP champion at VR46. The 46-year-old’s appearances in the paddock are rare nowadays, given his sports car racing career.
Rossi views VR46 as a business and wants to see the team be profitable. But when he does come to the races, he proves to be the perfect leader for his team.
Valentino Rossi proved he is the perfect MotoGP team owner with compliments to Fabio Di Giannantonio in Qatar
After finishing sixth in the Sprint, the Qatar Grand Prix did not go to plan for Di Giannantonio. He collided with Alex Marquez in the opening stages, ruining his race.
Later on, Jorge Martin crashed ahead of him at turn 12, with the VR46 rider having nowhere to go to avoid him. Diggia hit the Aprilia rider as he sustained 11 fractured ribs and a punctured lung.
Di Giannantonio went straight to the Aprilia garage after the race to check if Martin was OK. He limped home P16 on what was a weekend where he was struggling with understeer.
However, Rossi was complimenting his rider in the garage as he noted his problems on Friday after practice. While he acknowledged the errors, the Italian had a positive outlook, always telling Diggia how good a job he was doing – he is the perfect team owner.
“Here you’re understeering quite a bit, but you manage to accelerate well and then the direction change is really good, quick, bam bam, right where it needs to be. On the left, really well done,” he said via VR46’s official YouTube channel.
“Turn 2 was good too, very clean, consistent, nice. That thing you were complaining about on the first outing, now you were able to do it, so good job!
“You have good speed, a good distance covered, the front is already curved and it doesn’t cause understeering, so you can even enter a bit wider because you delay it enough.”
READ MORE: Everything to know about Valentino Rossi’s VR46 from current riders to bike
Valentino Rossi hailed Franco Morbidelli’s performance at the Qatar Grand Prix
Rossi had the same approach with Franco Morbidelli. He finished third in the Sprint and the main race in Qatar, having taken the lead of Sunday’s race on the first corner.
Morbidelli was promoted to third after the race following Maverick Vinales’ 16-second time penalty for a tyre pressure infringement. The Italian is third in the standings heading into the next race at Jerez.
After his podium in the Sprint in Qatar, Rossi was loving Morbidelli’s late braking as he secured another top three finish in 2025.
“At turn one at the beginning and then at turn 9 and 10. Very good start, very good braking into the first corner. Nice late braking on Quartararo!” he said. “You take that turn really fast!”
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