Lettenbichler Three-Peats Red Bull TKO; Hart Second; Bolt Third

The 16th annual Red Bull Tennessee Knockout wrapped August 28-30, 2026, at the Trials Training Center in Sequatchie, Tennessee - not to be confused with Abestone Hard Enduro in Italy, which is a separate FIM Hard Enduro World Championship round running September 4-6. TKO remains the U.S. hard-enduro festival: 535 entries across Youth, Amateur, Women’s Pro, and Pro, with Sunday’s knockout ladder deciding who gets the short-course main.

Manuel “Mani” Lettenbichler (Red Bull KTM) won the Pro main for his fourth career TKO and third straight, completing a clean sweep of Pro stages per Cycle News, Motorcycle.com’s press package, and Dirt Bike Magazine. He led all eight laps of the newly extended 45-minutes-plus-one-lap final and stopped the clocks at 59:55.957. Trystan Hart (FMF KTM) finished second - his third consecutive TKO runner-up - nearly three minutes behind Lettenbichler and just six seconds ahead of Billy Bolt (Husqvarna), who rounded out the podium in his second race back from an arm injury.

TKO was also the AMA National Hard Enduro / U.S. Hard Enduro Series finale. Hart had already clinched the Pro title at Hollow Point earlier in August; Dirt Bike Magazine reports he closed the season as champion with 205 points, with Cody Webb the series runner-up. Rockstar Energy Husqvarna Factory Racing’s Ryder LeBlond finished ninth in the TKO Final and, per the team’s September 1 release, locked third overall in the 2026 National Hard Enduro Championship after a season with four podiums. The weekend was about Tennessee rock and heat for the world hard-enduro circus - championship math for most AMA Pro regulars was already largely settled.

Saturday’s Pro hot lap set the tone. Lettenbichler’s 6:10.528 was more than 30 seconds clear of Eddie Karlsson’s Stark Varg EX (6:42.455), with Hart third (6:44.756), Bolt fourth, and LeBlond fifth. Sunday’s first Knockout on the 14-mile long course again went to Lettenbichler (1:01:24), with Hart 34 seconds back and Karlsson still inside a minute. Bracket Knockouts funneled 20 riders into the main on the short course - Red Bull Ravine with the new “Bad Behavior” obstacle, creek bed, boulder piles, and three technical hillclimbs.

Main-event texture that matters to weekend hard-enduro riders: Hart holeshot into the rocks, but Lettenbichler took over before the ravine and never gave the lead back. Karlsson pressured for second until a derailed chain dropped him; he clawed back to fourth. Hart’s crashes - including one in Bad Behavior - briefly handed second to Bolt before Hart reclaimed it for a six-second buffer at the flag. Jonny Walker crashed on the opening straight on the Triumph 450 four-stroke, climbed as high as fourth, then slipped to fifth after a last-lap tip-over. Webb finished sixth on a Yamaha YZ250X as the top American. Toby Martyn (Stark), Matthew Stevens (KTM), LeBlond (Husqvarna), and Kawelo Huddy (KTM) completed the top 10 - an international top-10 footprint Dirt Bike Magazine notes spanned seven countries.

Lettenbichler told Cycle News he rode to stay smooth rather than redline every section - “I couldn’t believe I pulled such a gap on the guys. It is pretty damn hard out there.” Hart called three hours of racing in the heat “crazy,” citing a tree hit and a hole that put him “into the red zone.” Bolt called the longer main “a bit of a blitz,” admitting a first-corner crash and a late dig when Hart’s mistake reopened second - still happy to leave Sequatchie on the box.

Women’s Pro (Saturday, two rounds with top Amateurs): Rachel Gutish won on a Rieju and finished 27th overall among that field; Katie Hall-Leah (TM) was second and Nikki Russell (GasGas) third, matching Cycle News and Dirt Bike’s class notes. Amateur overalls on Saturday went to Hawaii’s Boogie Rivera (KTM), with Makana Barger and Ayden Marinchek next - Barger later made the 20-rider Pro main and finished 18th. eMoto Sportsman: Adam Giles (RFN) edged Brett Baldwin (Bonnell) by six seconds, Isaac Johnston (Zero) third.

If you mostly follow FIM HEWC headlines out of Europe, keep TKO separate from Abestone - Sequatchie is the AMA hard-enduro season's public festival, not the Italian world-championship round happening this weekend. For U.S. dual-sport and club enduro riders, the takeaway is format and terrain: multi-hour heat, rock sections that punish rushed lines, and a main that rewards smooth mistakes management over hero pulls. Cycle News' full weekend recap has the Amateur sheets and video, Motorcycle.com and Total Motorcycle carry the factory notes, and if you are building toward hard-enduro pace, our Hollow Point title story and the 2027 KTM 300 EXC HARDENDURO first look add the bike-side context.

The short version: Lettenbichler, Hart and Bolt made the Pro podium at Sequatchie as TKO closed out the AMA hard-enduro season. Just don't mix it up with Abestone.

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