MALMESBURY’S Louis Harvey has been crowned the Senior Rotax Class Ultimate Karting Champion for 2022 after a thrilling final round at Wigan’s Three Sisters race track earlier this month.

The Wiltshire teenager was leading the championship by some distance heading into the final round but still need a couple of positive results to take home the title.

Harvey managed to avoid confrontation to secure the requisite number of points and land his second national karting title.

As a result of winning, Harvey was awarded a full test day with Scorpion Motorsport in a GB4 race car with the possibility of racing in the 2023 series if the test is successful and the right sponsorship can be found.

Although the weekend ended in celebration, the final round began in far from ideal circumstances. Practicing at a track he had never set eyes on before, Harvey collided with another driver in first practice and was forced to watch his team straighten his chassis as precious preparation time ticked away. A mis-firing problem then occurred in second practice as frustration grew for the Wiltshire teenager.

But the talented racer showed his class in the third and fourth practice sessions to match – and then top – the times of the fastest group of drivers on track.

With confidence regained, Harvey took second in heat one – having started from sixth – before underwhelming finishes of 13th and eighth place in the subsequent heats.

The tension was palpable in Sunday’s super heats, with Harvey in the A race and his championship contender Kordal in the B version.

The Wiltshire racer knew if he finished fourth or above then the Championship was his, but after starting in second, Harvey made a poor start and dropped back to fifth. While pushing for that desired fourth spot, an accident elsewhere on the track caused the race to be red-flagged and Harvey was forced to settle for fifth.

All was not lost for the Wiltshire teenager, however, as Kordal needed to win his super heat in order to stay alive in the championship fight. He was unable to do so, finishing third, and Harvey was crowned champion with a race to spare.

A sixth-place finish in the final race was no more than a precession for Harvey, as the teenager was not required to compete.

Speaking afterwards, Harvey said: “I knew I could do it, I just needed to stay consistent. Winning this championship meant a lot to me as I wanted to win it in memory of Ashley Todd my 2021 mechanic who sadly passed away earlier in the year.”