Eddie Karlsson finishes Erzbergrodeo without rear brake and makes electric history

The 30th edition of the Red Bull Erzbergrodeo will be remembered for two things. Mani Lettenbichler claiming a fifth win on the Iron Giant. And the day electric motorcycles proved they belong.

For the first time in the event’s three-decade history, electric machines were allowed to line up alongside combustion bikes: no separate class, no handicap, no asterisk. Same mountain, same clock, same 500 starters. Of those, 43 rode electric, the overwhelming majority on a Stark VARG EX.

When the dust settled on June 7 in Eisenerz, Austria, only 15 riders had made it within the four-hour limit. Three of them were electric.

Eddie Karlsson was the first. The Swedish Stark Factory rider put the VARG across the line in ninth place overall, 3 hours and 42 minutes into one of the most brutal days in hard enduro. He did it with a rear brake failure.

Guy Salens – THE PACK: “Eddie Karlsson lost his rear brake in the opening corner: a rock strike, race over before it began for most riders. He rode the remaining three hours and forty-two minutes without it, every descent a white-knuckle battle against the handlebars. He didn’t back off. He didn’t stop. He pushed the Stark VARG EX to the finish line, ninth out of 500 starters, one of only 15 riders to complete the course, and the first electric motorcycle to ever finish the Erzbergrodeo.”

One spot behind him came Graham Jarvis, 51 years old, finishing tenth on the JARV-E, an electric prototype he helped design himself. A five-time Erzbergrodeo winner riding a machine that didn’t exist two years ago, across a course that’s broken most people who’ve ever attempted it. Jarvis doesn’t do quiet exits.

Stark teammate Toby Martyn rounded out the electric story in 12th, meaning one in five finishers at the 2026 Erzbergrodeo was battery-powered.

It didn’t start on Sunday either. Earlier in the week, at the REMUS Rocket Ride uphill sprint, Stark swept the podium: Sébastien Tortelli taking the win, ahead of Marc Sans and David Herbreteau. A statement before the main event had even begun.

To make the race possible for electric entries, Stark worked with the organisers on dedicated infrastructure: a charging station in the arena, a second powered point on the mountain itself, and a battery-swap location at the same position on course where petrol bikes are permitted to refuel.

Lettenbichler won the race, as most expected. The Red Bull KTM man crossed the line in 3:05, stretching his lead to over eight minutes by the finish and joining Taddy Blazusiak and Jarvis himself as the only five-time winners in Erzbergrodeo history.

But the podium wasn’t the headline. On the day electric motorcycles were finally let through the gate at the world’s most iconic extreme enduro, they didn’t just participate. They finished. They finished inside the top ten. And one of them did it with no rear brake on the most unforgiving mountain in the sport.

Thirty years in, the Iron Giant has a new sound.