The 2026 MotoGP season is revving up, and we’re previewing it by talking to VR46’s Franco Morbidelli.
A few weeks ago, VR46 showed off their new “BLACKANDLIGHT” livery for their 2026 MotoGP Ducati Bikes.
“This year we wanted to change, we kept the yellow, which is our colour, but we put the black, which is more racing, and came back a bit more to our classical colours. So we’re ready. The bikes are so beautiful – now we just need to be fast,” team owner Valentino Rossi told MotoGP.com.
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Ahead of the MotoGP season, we sat down with VR46’s Franco Morbidelli to learn about how he got into racing, how he prepares for races, and his thoughts on other sports outside of racing.
Being a MotoGP rider is a crazy profession. What made you want to become a rider?
Franco Morbidelli: I started my career, let’s say, because of a crazy father, like most of the parents of the guys that practice this sport, who used to race when he was younger. He was a mechanic. He had a workshop in Rome. So he decided to put me on a pocket bike when I was very young, and he started to do this thing with me. It was our thing. We used to do this together and was a really bonding chance between father and son.
I had the chance stay with him a lot of time, until I was 18. It was a really cool experience, a really good chance, a really good relationship between father and son. The building up and my passion came after, I have to say. After some years, I understood that the path I’ve been put on was the right one for me, it was the one that I enjoyed the most in life. I was really happy about my father’s choice, my father’s crazy choice. And that’s how it started. And here we are.
What riders did you look up to growing up?
The rider that made me say, I want to do that was Vale, for sure Valentino (Rossi), and the other one was Marco Simoncelli. When I was a little kid, and I used to go to pocket bike races, I was very young, and there was Marco racing with pocket bikes. Then after some time, I started actually racing in the Italian Championship, pocket bikes, and Marco was in the World Championship.
So looking at him, to me, it looked like the normal path and the normal way was racing pocket bikes, win some races, and then go to World Championship. I would later understood that the task would have been much more difficult than that. But the riders I was looking at in this way: Vale was more of a legend, untouchable, while Marco was a path to follow. But these two riders were my references and my favorites.
What is it about racing these super-fast bikes that gets you? Is it the adrenaline? Is it just the technical aspect? What about it makes it special for you?
Well, of course, the first thing that hits you is the speed and the adrenaline, and the adrenaline rush that this sport can give you. The fact that we go at more than 320 ks per hour, less than 5 centimeters apart from each other, trying to overtake one another in really difficult spots of the track, facing really difficult situations, and facing really difficult injuries. To overcome these difficulties or things that might scare you, or might scare the people who are not used to this sport, these are the main things that hit you at first.
This particular flavor of the extreme sport, of something really extreme, because a machine that goes at 350 with a real human being on it, it’s really something unique, and it’s really something out of the box. It’s not really normal, and it’s really something unique to watch from the outside. Even for me, when I go on the road that goes around the track, on the service road, to watch the other bikes, I always remain impressed.
Are you an adrenaline junkie outside of racing?
Totally. Our sport is very related to adrenaline. It’s something that you chase after. When you’re home, you feel the lack of it when you’re not on the bike, when you’re not having those emotions. So you always try to find some things that might give you that feeling, that rush. I was talking with my friends the other day, and I definitely feel like an adrenaline junkie.
I always try to follow competition, do competition, I don’t do crazy stuff because I need to be fit for them when I go on the bikes. But I like basketball a lot, and that’s the thing that, in a way, recalls the adrenaline of the bikes for me, in that I’m not really good at it. When I compete with my friends on a court, I have that feeling. Or when I compete for everything that I can compete for with my friends, I have that feeling. I tell myself, Why am I pushing so much? And then I understand why I push so much because I need that feeling.
How do you mentally prepare for races?
The mind is a really important aspect of this sport, in general. For sure, being in a good place with your mind before coming to the races. It’s really important. I have my style, my way of being. Everybody has their own style. I can tell you what I do. I try to be good. I try to enjoy my time at home and enjoy my time as much as I can, being grateful for what I’m living.
I try to enjoy everything to the maximum and not be carried away by all the drama that comes with this beautiful thing, which is okay, but it can carry you away from your sport and affect your performance, because that’s what it’s all about. If I don’t perform well, I wouldn’t be here. The thing that makes me perform the best, I think, is being present, being here, and being grateful for what I’m doing. That’s what I try to do.
I heard that you’re a UFC fan?
Yes, I watch some fights sometimes. It’s a sport that I like because, in a way, I see some similarities with my sport. Our sport is a fight. When we are, as I said, when we are reaching a corner at 350, 24 of us all close together, all trying to get the best spot, always all trying to get the piece of tarmac of your opponent, is something really similar to, I think, get into an octagon with another opponent. For sure, those are 5, 3-minute rounds, so those 15 minutes or 25 for a championship, those 25 to 15 minutes maybe are more intense than our full race, than our 45-minute race. It’s something that I love to follow, and I love to learn from the athletes that I see, learned from those guys who are able to do amazing stuff.
You got to meet former UFC champion Jiri Prochazka. What was the experience like?
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He’s a cool guy. He’s a Samurai, definitely. I was really excited to meet him. And then in that race, I wasn’t racing, so I had time to speak with him and know him well. And I was impressed by how locked in he was, even in trying to understand how the bike worked.
I was explaining to him the features and tools on the bike, and he was really interested in what was going on on the bike and he was really interested in what was going on around him. Then, at one point, I faked an attack, and he faked an attack back, and it was something heavy. It was really impressive. If he had caught me for real, if he had pushed that punch, I would have been dead, I think. So it was beautiful to meet him.
Are there any other sports you like?
As a sports guy, I love sports in general. I believe that athletes are something really inspiring for people because if you want to be an athlete, you need to go through challenges that everybody is going to face in their life, but maybe in a more spread amount of time.
While an athlete needs to go challenge by challenge, after challenge, in a shorter amount of time, and with a really great amount of energy. There are many, many sports guys that I follow. For sure, one of my favorite one is Francesco Totti from Roma. But if we choose a fighter, Jiri (Prochazka) for sure, is one of them. Anderson Silva is another one. Terence Crawford, the boxer, is my guy lately. I definitely loved what he did. I’m definitely going to go through every single one of his fights.
Definitely other sports I follow, SGA, Steph Curry, and many guys, many idols sports and many great people, great human beings that are able to do stuff that to us looks normal, but doing doing it in a top-level way like they do, it’s something I can assure you really, really difficult and really, really challenging and that can inspire everybody for their lives and for every path they’re going through.
MotoGP is coming back to the US this year. Any thoughts on Austin as a city?
I listened to a lot of rock music there, a lot of good, unknown musicians there. The style of the city is beautiful. And the track as well. Austin, the track is something heavy.
What type of music do you listen to before races?
I listen to different kinds of music. But if I have to say what I listen to the most, it’s old-school hip hop. That’s what I listen to. Sometimes 50 Cent, sometimes Eminem. Now I’m listening to some Nate Dogg as well, which is not hip-hop, but that hip-hop, of course, Tupac. I listen to a lot of hip hop.
Which US City would you like to see MotoGP race in, other than Austin?
New Jersey. I mean, New York GP would be great, but I think that wouldn’t be possible. Somewhere around New Jersey, they can build up a track around there. Then we will go to New York by ourselves.
The 2026 Moto GP begins on February 27th in Thailand, and will return to the U.S. on March 27th-29th in Austin.
The post Get To Know VR46 Rider Franco Morbidelli Ahead Of The 2026 MotoGP Season (Interview) appeared first on BroBible.
Get To Know VR46 Rider Franco Morbidelli Ahead Of The 2026 MotoGP Season (Interview)
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