South Australian Brett Metcalfe remains content with his eighth place result despite a last lap crash that forced him out of a certain top five finish in last weekend’s Houston round of the Monster Energy AMA Supercross, an FIM World Championship.

The Rockstar Makita Suzuki rookie finished fourth in his heat race before maintaining a top five place during the 20-lap main event, only to crash in the whoops while homing in on his maiden podium result in the 450 class.

“I’m happy with the way I rode tonight,” said Metcalfe. “The team made some good changes this week. We made some big improvements to the engine and I have to thank Yoshimura for all their help and everybody on the team.

“I came out strong in the heat race and the main event was going good right until the end. I made a couple mistakes – a couple guys got me at the end there and I threw it away in the whoops trying to get a position back on the last lap.

“I’m happy for next week because San Diego is close to home. I should have a good week riding and each week my riding has been improving. We just need to improve the result.”

Metcalfe now sits equal sixth in the standings with KTM’s Andrew Short after six of 17 rounds.