Marco Bezzecchi
VR46 Racing Team boast the rare status of being owned by one of the greatest riders in MotoGP history, yet even Valentino Rossi alone is not enough to solve every issue.
Rossi wasted zero time between retiring at the end of the 2021 MotoGP season and bringing the VR46 squad to the premier class in 2022. VR46 had already raced in Moto3 from 2014 to 2020 and Moto2 from 2017 to 2022, with the team focusing just on MotoGP since 2023.
Marco Bezzecchi also finished third in the 2023 riders’ championship aboard a Ducati GP22, as VR46 also sealed third place in that year’s teams’ standings. VR46 currently sit fifth in the 2025 teams’ standings on 318 points, through Franco Morbidelli and Fabio Di Giannantonio.
Morbidelli also ranks sixth in the riders’ standings ahead of Di Giannantonio in seventh by a single point with two rounds of the 2025 campaign remaining. The pair have also registered two and three Grand Prix podiums respectively over the first 20 rounds of the season so far.
VR46 ‘need more help’ than Valentino Rossi can provide to appeal to more sponsors
VR46 team manager Pablo Nieto thinks Rossi is unlike any other MotoGP team owner, as the seven-time premier class champion does not take any money out of the outfit in his quest to see them compete. But team director Alessio ‘Uccio’ Salucci fears Rossi alone is not enough.
READ MORE: Everything to know about Valentino Rossi’s VR46 from current riders to bike
While Rossi helps VR46 appeal to sponsors, Salucci admits the outfit need “more help” than the Italian can provide if they are to appeal to more brands and increase the team’s budget. He also acknowledges that it is “essential” that VR46 improve their form if they are to grow.
Salucci told SPEEDWEEK: “Being Valentino Rossi’s team helps us in our search for sponsors. But we need more help, because a MotoGP team requires a large budget and a motorcycle fairing isn’t particularly large for displaying advertising.
“That’s why we’re constantly working on finding new ways to acquire additional partners. We have excellent hospitality and can offer our partners special tours, but the most important thing is the results.
“Even though we’re Team VR46, if we finish eighth or ninth, the partners aren’t happy. After a few years in a class, good results are essential. That’s always the case.”
Lucio Cecchinello expects independent teams will have ‘greater prominence’ in the 2027-2031 contract cycle
Di Giannantonio’s P2 in the Australian Grand Prix at Phillip Island is VR46’s only podium over the past 11 Grands Prix, despite recording four between their two riders across the first nine rounds of the 2025 season. Morbidelli was last on a podium with P3 in the Qatar Grand Prix.
READ MORE: Everything you need to know about Valentino Rossi from stats to net worth
Salucci will hope to celebrate more podiums for Di Giannantonio and Morbidelli next year to set VR46 up with a bigger budget for the introduction of MotoGP’s new regulations in 2027. The 2027 season will even see MotoGP remove the independent title for the satellite teams.
LCR owner and IRTA president Lucio Cecchinello has confirmed that MotoGP will refer to all of the teams on the grid from 2027 as teams instead of constructors or independent outfits. The change may help Salucci fulfil his plans to improve VR46’s reach beyond Rossi’s appeal.
“That’s correct, and it’s good news for us,” Cecchinello told GPOne. “All the existing satellite teams will gain greater prominence as a result. To be honest, the factory teams have always had a stronger appeal for both riders and sponsors.”
Cecchinello has also confirmed that the change in identification for the teams on the grid in the 2027 MotoGP season will let any outfit build their own bike(s) and buy an 850cc engine from one of the manufacturers. But he doubts any team would have the budget to do so.
He added: “Ultimately, the existing manufacturers themselves have to decide whether they would just lease new 850cc engines to a team starting in 2027… As a passionate team principal, I support such a concept. It would really appeal to me.
“But in reality, hardly any team today has the skills and resources to have a chassis built, to work out the fairing and the entire aerodynamics. That’s a very complex task that only the engineers from the motorcycle manufacturers’ racing departments can accomplish.
“You also need access to a wind tunnel if you want to be competitive. I can’t imagine a MotoGP team simultaneously acting as a constructor in the foreseeable future, like McLaren in Formula 1, for example.”
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