After two days of intense racing on Hangtown’s rough and rutted course, Markelon emerged with her first overall victory of the season after swapping moto wins with Fasnacht. Markelon came out on top of the two-way battle with a 2-1 moto tally, compared to Fasnacht’s 1-2 performance. Since the two rider’s split scores, Fasnacht retains her 11-point advantage in the series standings heading into round five at the Tennessee National in Blountville, Tennessee.

Yamaha’s Mackenzie Tricker got a great jump off the line in moto one to kick things off, with Fasnacht right on her rear wheel. Tricker pushed Fasnacht wide in turn two, however, and the Kawasaki rider dropped back to fifth.

Tricker led the first several laps of the race, as Fasnacht slowly worked her way back into second place. Heading down one of Hangtown’s bumpy hills, Fasnacht made her move around the outside of Tricker to take the lead. Tricker fell short a time later and dropped off the pace. 

Meanwhile, Markelon was on a charge of her own, and before the end of the moto, she had worked her way into second ahead of Yamaha’s Kaitlyn Morrow and Honda’s Tarah Geiger. In the end, Fasnacht took the moto win ahead of Markelon, Morrow and Geiger, with Tricker rounding out the top five.

Moto two started with Fasnacht within the top five, but she was trailing the defending champ Markelon, who was railing out front with the lead. Fasnacht spent most of the moto working her way into second and by the end of the race the order was Markelon, Fasnacht, Geiger and Morrow, making the overall Markelon (2-1), Fasnacht (1-2), Tarah Geiger (4-3) and Morrow (3-4).

Even though she finished second, after four rounds, Fasnacht leads the series standings with 180 points, followed by Markelon with 169 and Tricker in third with 142.