VR46 disagree with Ducati’s decision to run only three factory bikes

VR46 do not agree with Ducati’s stance to run just three factory bikes next season.

The exit of Pramac as a Ducati satellite team, into the arms of Yamaha, will change the playing field dramatically in 2025.

Ducati will be left with only VR46 and Gresini as satellite teams, reducing their presence from eight to six bikes.

Although Pramac currently have access to two factory bikes, next season Ducati will dish out only one to VR46, and none for Gresini.

“I don't really agree with Gigi Dall'Igna,” VR46 team boss Uccio Salucci told Motorsport.

“Because we will have only one updated bike, while I would have wanted two as we have always done.

“But unfortunately or fortunately it is Ducati who decides, we will have one and we will make do with it.

“We will try to make it work in the best way, even if the other manufacturers are organised with four and we have three. But this will become even more unique because there will be two red ones and one of ours.”

It is expected that Fabio di Giannantonio, who currently rides a year-old Desmosedici with VR46, will sign a new contract to stay with the team and will profit from the use of a GP25 next season.

His teammate remains uncertain. VR46 have lost Marco Bezzecchi to Aprilia.

Salucci is confident about the team’s status within Ducati’s smaller ranks next season.

“They chose us as a reference team, starting from 2025 because Pramac left, but Ducati had already chosen us for 2027 as a reference team, independently of Pramac,” he insisted.

Di Giannantonio has been VR46’s standout rider this season, adding to his emphatic end-of-2023 with Gresini when he won the Qatar MotoGP.

Teammate Bezzecchi, by contrast, has found the GP23 far more challenging than the GP22, when he won his and his team’s first MotoGP race in 2023.