BMW insists “WEC remains a great championship, even without Valentino Rossi”

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After two seasons in the World Endurance Championship, Valentino Rossi has stepped away from the series, and while it's a loss for some fans BMW believes the series is more than capable of absorbing that loss.

Rossi’s raced for BMW's customer WRT team in the LMGT3 category in both 2024 and 2025, but was absent from the entry list this year. The MotoGP legend had become a major crowd-puller for the WEC, but opted instead for a full campaign in the GT World Challenge Europe.

Rossi wanted to race fewer weekends in order to spend more time with his family and therefore had to skip GTWCE events in 2025 — aside from the 24 Hours of Spa — due to his WEC commitments.

Now, the Italian returns to GTWCE, where he competes exclusively against other GT3 cars — something he prefers over multi-class racing. While it does mean the WEC loses an icon, Andreas Roos, head of BMW M motorsport, says the championship has nothing to worry about.

“I think the championship is very stable,” Roos told Motorsport sister title Motorsport-Total.com. “Of course, a driver like Valentino Rossi is an absolute train horse. He has a huge fanbase worldwide.

“He is an icon in motorsport and two-wheeler sport. He has already proven what he can do in four-wheel racing. He has already won races there.

“It's definitely a loss in terms of fan engagement. But the championship still has great names and great manufacturers. I don't want to say it's not a loss.

"I don't want to say it's a loss to lose Valentino Rossi from a championship. But I think the championship is a great and stable championship with all the manufacturers.”

#46 Team WRT BMW M4 LMGT3: Ahmad Al Harthy, Valentino Rossi, Kelvin Van Der Linde