A factory-backed Stark Future team has been confirmed to race the Stark VARG in the MX1 class of the 2026 Motul ACU British Motocross Championship — the sport’s premier domestic category, and the first time an electric bike has lined up against 450cc machinery in the series.

MXGB Series Director Paul Irwin confirmed the news, describing 2026 as a controlled trial for electric bikes in the championship. “It feels like the right time to trial an electric bike racing in the Championship in a controlled manner,” Irwin said. For now, the Stark Future entry is limited to a two-rider team, and no other electric machines will be permitted to race in the series this season — this is a deliberate, contained test rather than an open door.

What happened

Experienced rider Steven Clarke, who competed for Stark during the 2026 Arenacross Tour, has been confirmed as one of the two riders; the second seat is yet to be announced. The championship opens March 15 at Hawkstone Park. Stark’s presence in UK racing has been building steadily — the brand first appeared domestically in the 2024 Arenacross Tour, where Jack Brunell won the title in his first season on the VARG, and has since expanded with additional Arenacross riders. MX1 is the next step up: a full outdoor motocross championship against the sport’s established 450cc petrol machinery, not a shorter indoor arena format.

The electric dirt bike angle

This is a genuinely different test than anything Stark has done in the UK so far. Arenacross is short, technical, and indoors — a format that has arguably suited the VARG’s instant power and clutch-free delivery. MX1 outdoor motocross is longer, faster, and physically harder on both bike and rider over a full moto, which makes it a more demanding proving ground for questions around battery endurance, heat management and race-pace consistency against combustion 450s.

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It also follows a strong run of results for Stark elsewhere this season: the brand claimed the 2026 FIM SuperEnduro World Championship Manufacturers’ title, with Eddie Karlsson finishing fourth overall in the riders’ standings aboard the Varg EX against multiple-time world champion Billy Bolt. That’s a different discipline and a different bike variant, but it’s evidence the platform is proving competitive in more demanding forms of racing, not just short-format arena events.

What to watch

Whether the VARG can be genuinely race-competitive across a full MX1 outdoor season — not just present on the gate — is the real question 2026 will start to answer. Irwin’s framing of this as a “controlled” trial, with entry deliberately capped at two riders and no other electric machines admitted, suggests the championship is treating this as data-gathering first and competition second. How Clarke and his still-to-be-confirmed teammate perform against the MX1 field from round one at Hawkstone Park onward will shape whether the trial expands or stays capped.