BLACKANDLIGHT: New year, New Colors for Pertamina Enduro VR46

Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team have revealed their 2026 colours! On January 14 in Rome, the new “BLACKANDLIGHT” theme broke cover for the first time ahead of a record-breaking 22-race MotoGP season. Riders Fabio Di Giannantonio and Franco Morbidelli took to the stage at the event, where fans also got to hear from the boss himself aka team owner and MotoGP Hall of Famer Valentino Rossi, as well as Team Director Alessio Salucci and Team Manager Pablo Nieto.

“Harmony is born in the tension of opposites” is the Heraclitus quote cited by the team at the start of their new era – light and shadow, fluo and black. “Our energy meets the depth of a new balance. 2026 is BLACKANDLIGHT. The other side of our soul” is how VR46 put it – lofty, as are their ambitions as we head into another season of MotoGP.

So what do you think?

Fabio Di Giannantonio: “It’s my third year with the Pertamina VR46 Racing Team. Amazing to start our new, third season together with these new colours, brighter bike with this yellow that is super col this year with the black. I expect to do great races as we ended the year last year in 2025, I hope to grow a lot during the year and fight at the front. It’s super special to start again with the team, with the same stuff this year, which is the first time for me in MotoGP. So feeling great and can’t wait to joint the track.

“It’s my second year as a factory Ducati rider so it will be a little different year compared to last year. I have more experience, also the team has more experience with this situation, I think I’m more mature and more ready to understand what will be better for me on the bike and what not. Can’t wait to start also with the team, and let’s see if we can improve a lot the bike to fight on the top.

“The new livery is amazing, I think it’s very VR style with this black and yellow, it reminds me a lot of Vale’s helmet and I think it’s much more aggressive, much more racing, so it suits me really good I think. It’s super special, Rome is my city and with my bike and my team here, it’s fantastic. For sure it’s something I will remember forever and it’s also fantastic for the team I think, as an Italian team, to have the launch of the new season in the capital of Italy, in Rome, such a historic city. It’s a really fabulous thing.”

Franco Morbidelli: “For this second season I’m really excited and really looking forward to starting the season. We have one more year of experience together and for sure this is gonna work out well for us, we are going to speed up some processes that happen during a race weekend and I’m really trustful in the crew and the whole team. For sure there are some things we need to improve from last year, which was a positive year – especially the first half. A year where we had some good results, some great ones, and also some bad ones. There are things to improve and we’re working on that, we’re together in this and looking forward to starting.

“The bike is beautiful. I really like the yellow colour, it’s a colour I really lean to and a colour that has always been around me. I definitely love it and that’s the soul of the bike. But the character of the bike is given by this black on the fuel tank and around the bike, and it’s really a racing combination of colours. So hopefully the bike is going to be quicker around the track because of this.

“The season launch in Rome was beautiful. Rome is a city I love, I was born there and lived ten years there. I have a lot of friends and a lot of connection with that city. For me it’s the most beautiful city in the world and to have the team presentation in such a special place is unique. And it’s a really nice thing – hopefully it will give the whole team some extra energy to face this 2026 season in the best way.”

Valentino Rossi, Team Owner: “We are ready, we are very optimistic and the target is try to do better than last year. Last year was an up and down season. Now in MotoGP it’s always very difficult for all teams to be able to remain in the top positions every weekend, so I think that can be the target for this year. Try to improve and try to be competitive everywhere.

“We changed this year. This is a project we did together with Aldo Drudi, it’s already our third season. At the beginning we started to modify a bit our image. Three years ago we did the yellow bike with the white, and we decided to continue that last year, but 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.”

credit: MotoGP and Pertamina Pertamina Enduro VR46 Racing Team