The week of November 19-26 the Rotax Max Grand Finals were held in Al Ain, UAE. This would make Scott Campbell's 8th trip to the Grand Finals trying now to repeat his performance in Italy last year for the World Championship. This trip for Team Canada would see 21 drivers on the team. With this number count it would be the biggest delegation ever at the Rotax Grand Finals.The week started of well with Scott being near the top of every practice session. Confident in his abilities he went into qualifying with one goal in his mind. After the session was over he was fastest in his group but not fastest overall. Having made one mistake on his fast lap we would end up in 3rd overall. The stage was set for some great racing with Scott not being the only Former World Champion in the grid. There were actually 5 other World Champions in the DD2 Masters class. This was the making of some great racing.
The heat races would be a hard battle every race. With Campbell battling with his own group members most of the heats meant that every race it would be the same drivers. After the checkered flag dropped three times Scott would come out with a 2nd, 4th and a win. After the points were counted up Campbell would be starting for the outside pole position in the Pre-final.
In the Pre-final Scott got the jump with Cristiano Morgado and tried to break free. The other drivers did not start to battle behind and held the pace with the two. After the half way mark Campbell made the move for the lead and held it for only one lap as Morgado passed him back. After Scott gave up the lead his kart fell off and this meant he fell back into the clutches of the other drivers. On the final lap Campbell got moved out of the way and sent off track but was able to hold on to the 4th spot at the line.
Knowing that he must make it back up to Morgado as fast he could, Scott made a break for the front off the start of the Final but in the middle of two drivers that were closing the door very quick Campbell had to try to back out as fast as he could. Just as he thought he was going to be clear of contact the 3rd place driver Dennis Kroes made contact with his left front tire and shear the hub in half. This meant that the kart now only had 3 tires on the ground with the other tire flying back at Campbell he would catch it. The kart would come to a stop in turn one and then had to drag it off the track and continue to watch the race unfold for the marshal station in turn one. After the race was completed and the kart was back at the pits they would see that there may have been a flaw in the hub which cause the hub to break.
The event ended up not the way Campbell wanted it to but it was not a total loss for Team Canada as they would end up walking away with another World Championship with Pier Luc Ouellette and second in the Nations Cup.
Next years Grand Finals will be held in Portugal and Scott hopes to back to give it another shot at the World Championship.
Photos by Cody Schindel of Autosport Media
