Scott Barnes has ended a difficult year outside the kart with a good display in it after finishing on the podium at the ROK Vegas Cup last weekend.

Barnes has had a tough 2026 after dealing with the grief of losing one of his biggest fans, his grandfather David Vallis, and a threat to his livelihood after his boat Hakuna Matata was destroyed in a fire in Hamilton Harbour.

But Barnes is made of strong stuff and is still determined to prove his worth at the highest level.

“It’s definitely been a crazy year,” Barnes said.

“With losing the boat, we weren’t able to race in October and we had more races on the books in the States this year. Unfortunately, the Rock Island got cancelled on Labour Day and so we haven’t really raced since March.

“Life has been tough the last few months, so getting back into the kart and getting back out to Vegas, which is always a fun place to race, was definitely fun and very helpful for the mind.”

Barnes had to deal with crazy weather and racing in hailstones for the first time in his career to ensure he had a good starting position for the race series.

“We had some crazy weather and it was really hard to pass on probably one of the tighter tracks I’ve ever raced on,” Barnes said.

“That made the qualifying session on Thursday really key to try to get up front and stay up front. We had a great qualifying session, just missed pole by a tenth of a second, and qualified second.

“That put us on the front row for all three heat races, which was key. Heat one started out dry and then there was a red flag after one lap because someone had a really hard flip.

“We sat and waited for 20 minutes while they attended to the driver and as we were getting ready to restart, it started raining and hailing, which is a first for me. But they actually let the race continue on slick tyres instead of letting us change to rain tyres.

“I was slipping and sliding all over the place on slick tyres in the hail and rain, so we fell to sixth in that race. We dried it up for the afternoon session and we came back and got a second in heat two.”

Barnes finished fifth and fourth in the last two heat races after overnight changes to his set-up failed to work and started the final in fourth position before making up a place to reach the podium.

“I raced up to second and ran in second for the most part but then had one little slip and fell to third overall. I probably should have been second, but any time you can podium in Vegas, I’m definitely happy with the results.

“I am still on the Maranello chassis, so still racing the Maranello kart, but I have changed engine builders to VTM. I have to thank Carlos Racing Engines for the last two and a half years as we won a lot of races and championships with him.

“The new engine was great all weekend and while it was not a huge change mentally, any time there is change, there is always something to get used to.”

Barnes is already fleshing out his 2027 calendar and expects to be busy.

“I’m definitely looking at doing a full series next year and see if we can compete for a championship,” he said.

“I was thinking about doing the Florida Winter Tour to defend the championship that we won this year, but I might try a different series, something we haven’t done yet to try something new

“At this point in my career, I’m trying to see if I can knock off stuff I haven’t done. Rock Island is definitely supposed to come back, so that will always be on the books and hopefully Vegas will be well.

“As ever I have to thank AllRise Bermuda and Butterfield & Vallis for their continued support with sponsorship. I couldn’t do it without them.”