In the midst of a breakout season in the 450SX class, Aaron Plessinger ran into some troubles with bike set up at the penultimate round at Salt Lake City that resulted in an eighth-place finish on the night.

In his third season in Monster Energy Supercross’ premier class, the Monster Energy Star Racing Yamaha rider has been incredibly impressive, managing to finish inside the top 10 in all but two of the 16 rounds so far and sitting fifth overall in the championship.

A fourth-place finish at Atlanta 3 saw him come into the penultimate round at Salt Lake City with a good bit of momentum, but his day was hampered by set-up issues.

“The day started out a little slow, I wasn’t really gelling with the bike in practice,” Plessinger explained. “That was kind of how it went all day long; I was just struggling with the bike setup and trying to get going.

“I had a good heat race going but about ripped my shroud off and then couldn’t really turn right that well and finished fourth.”

While he managed to find a decent pace for the main event, mistakes held him back from what would have been a potential fifth top-five finish of the season.

“In the main, I didn’t get a good start and was battling mid-pack,” he continued. “I made my way up to the back of Dylan [Ferrandis], but I just couldn’t get around him. Then I made a few bonehead mistakes and finished eighth.”

Plessinger will get one more shot at it this weekend for the final round of the series at Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City.