Valentino Rossi continues to train on a motorbike even after his farewell to the MotoGP World Championship. The Ranch of Tavullia remains the “temple” of two wheels.
The Tavullia Ranch has become a fundamental point of reference for the students of the VR46 Riders Academy for a decade now. A structure envied by every rider in the world, unique in its kind, which every year hosts many champions of every motorcycle category. And for eight years now it has been the scene of the ‘100 Km of Champions’, a competition with flat track motorcycles which attracts illustrious names from every corner of Europe towards the end of autumn.
The project of Valentino Rossi ranch it was born from the mind of dad Graziano, as he tells the microphones of Sky Sport MotoGP Alberto Tebaldi, historic collaborator of the Doctor. “I remember one day it was Vale, his father and me. Graziano was holding a map with a drawing on it and, while we were driving along this hill, he tried to mime the traverse… He had it right, he has always been the guru of this training, he was ten years ahead“.
Valentino Rossi master of the new champions
It is certainly no coincidence that the current MotoGP world champion came from the Academy I’m sorry Bagnaia and the best MotoGP 2022 rookie, Marco Bezzecchi. In the past, Bagnaia himself had already won the Moto2 title and Franco Morbidelli claimed MotoGP runner-up in 2020 and three years earlier he took the middle class title. “For us it is a source of pride, Valentino Rossi has always trained here and the boys grew up here (of the Academy, ed). We think the Ranch has technically and emotionally made a big contribution“.
A great form of training for the VR46 guys, who can not only train challenging among the best riders in the MotoGPbut they have an unreleased track at their disposal, “complex, very large and fast, with altimetric variations, curves of any type of radius. It also has a particular feature: the track is alive, it changes continuously even during the same lap“, explained Alberto Tebaldi. “The riders have to change technique and style and it changes a lot even during the same day“.
In Valentino Rossi’s short-term projects there is that of making the ‘100 Km of Champions‘. In the 2022 edition, victory ended up in the hands of former pupils Lorenzo Baldassarri and Elia Bartolini. “The goal is to grow more and more especially in terms of rider names – explained the nine-time world champion -. For me this is the most important motorcycle race of the year (laughs, ed)”. After having said at the World Championship Valentino Rossi dedicated himself exclusively to four wheels, even if he never stopped training on motorcycles. And the ‘100 km’ is the only motorcycle competition he has left.
