MALMESBURY’S Louis Harvey leads the 2022 Ultimate Karting Championship in Senior Rotax after a third-place finish in a highly-eventful round four in Cumbria last weekend.

A mixed series of races at Rowrah kart track saw Harvey unable to gain much momentum, but the teenager showed his class to put himself in a commanding position for the title with two rounds to go.

Following an inconsistent practice session, Harvey was drawn to line up eighth, 11th and 26th for his heats.

In heat one, the Wiltshire driver was forced to avoid a first-corner incident by taking to the grass, however, this saw him drop to 15th before recovering nicely to finish in eighth.

Further bad luck in heat two cancelled out a stunning start. After moving from 11th to second, and then the lead following a red flag, Harvey was handed a five-second penalty for a nose-cone infraction when avoiding a spinning kart at the start of the race and he was ultimately forced down to sixth.

A miscommunication by the stewards ensured the start of heat three became a total farce, and Harvey was frustrated in his attempt to score valuable points - ending in 22nd.

With the points from the heats added up, Harvey lined up 10th and set about navigating his way towards the front. He was fourth on lap two, and then second by lap four. Harvey dropped to third in the closing stages but a penalty ahead of him promoted the Wiltshire racer back to second place overall.

Lining up in 10th for the Super Final, a fantastic start by Harvey pushed him straight into third before shortly taking second.

However, the team knew they had made the wrong decision on gearing and taking the lead was out of the question. Unfortunately, Harvey was unable to hold off the racer behind him and he was forced to settle for third - a result good enough to take him top of the overall standings.