Hero MotoSports names four riders for 2027 rally raid season

Hero MotoSports Team Rally announced its rider line up for the 2027 season on November 4, 2026. The Hero MotoCorp factory team will field four riders in the FIA and FIM World Rally Raid Championship, known as W2RC, with the Dakar Rally in January as the season's biggest target.

The four names are Ross Branch of Botswana, Nacho Cornejo of Chile, Michael Docherty of South Africa and David Braceras of Spain. Branch and Cornejo are the team's established pair. Branch is the 2024 FIM World Rally Raid champion and a two time Dakar stage winner. Cornejo was the 2016 FIM Junior World Rally Raid champion and his best Dakar finish is fourth overall, from 2020, with nine stage wins to his name.

Who are the new signings

Docherty and Braceras are the fresh additions. Docherty holds the record for stage wins in the Rally2 category, 37 of them, and finished third in the 2025 FIM Rally Raid World Cup. He also won the 2025 Abu Dhabi Desert Challenge and took two stage wins at Dakar 2023.

Braceras is the bigger departure for the team. He was the 2022 Spain MX2 motocross champion and only switched to rally raid this year. His debut came at the Baja España Aragon in September 2026, where he won the prologue stage before an injury forced him to withdraw from the rest of the event. Hero MotoSports is betting on that raw speed translating to the dunes.

Building on Hero's best Dakar yet

The 2027 line up follows the strongest Dakar result in Hero MotoSports' history. At Dakar 2026, run in January this year, Cornejo finished seventh overall and Branch eighth, the team's first ever double top 10 finish at the event. Both riders held top 10 positions through all 13 stages despite penalties, crashes and tyre trouble along the way.

For an Indian two wheeler brand, that result matters. Hero MotoCorp uses the rally programme to test and prove components that eventually show up on road bikes, and the team has run in the Dakar since 2016. A repeat top 10, or better, in January 2027 would extend that record with a four rider squad for the first time, giving Hero more cards to play across the gruelling stages that make up a Dakar fortnight.

The team has not yet detailed its full 2027 calendar beyond confirming the W2RC season and the Dakar Rally as the headline round. Hero has previously used events like the Desafio Ruta 40 and Baja Aragon as tune up rounds ahead of Dakar, and a similar build up is likely before January.

Sources

• Hero MotoSports Announces Strong Rider Line-Up for 2027
• Hero MotoSports confirma a Ross Branch, Nacho Cornejo, Michael Docherty y David Braceras para 2027
• Dakar Rally 2026: Hero MotoSports Finishes Inside Top 10. KTM and Dacia Secure Overall Wins
• Get to know the Hero MotoSports riders