Fast, female and frequently fearless when it comes to banging bars and rubbing plastics with her male counterparts, Austria’s Yasmin Poppenreiter (GASGAS) is now in her second decade competing in the FIM Flat Track World Championship.
The twenty-nine-year-old first contested the series back in 2013 and is a real racing all-rounder who also competes in Supermoto and Motocross when she can fit the disciplines into her busy schedule, although it is in the demanding and adrenalin-charged sport of Flat Track where she excels on the world stage.
“Flat Track is a sport where you get to know your own limits and learn to overcome them,” she said. “For me, it makes no difference that I race with men. You can learn a lot and it is also accepted by many riders that I often start as the only woman in the field.”
When your passion involves travelling around Europe chasing a dream, having an understanding employer is vital, so as a salesperson for Austrian KTM and GASGAS dealership Schruf Motorrad she is in an ideal job and can feel confident that the motorcycles she sells during the week are capable of winning at the weekends.
Like many of her rivals, Poppenreiter – whose racing role model is Dutch superstar and multi-time FIM Motocross World Champion Jeffrey Herlings – was introduced to motorcycles and racing through her family.
“My father road raced and used to take me to the track when I was little and I got my first bike from him when I was five years old.”
Listing winning the Austrian Flat Track Championship in 2017 as her biggest achievement on two-wheels, Poppenreiter had to wait until the third Final of the 2023 Flat Track World Championship at Boves in Italy last weekend to score her first points of the season.
However, her form in her Heat races has often been impressive and while she is determined to carry her growing momentum into the fourth of this year’s five Finals at Pardubice in the Czech Republic this coming Saturday (23 September), she is not the sort of rider to make predictions.
“I haven’t set myself any goals, I just want to finish every race as well as possible.”
Racing in the Stadion Pardubice – Svítkov is scheduled to get under way with the opening Heat at 13:00 local time.