The second ever FIM MiniGP Canada Series champion was crowned on Friday, as Lincoln Scott secured the title after a thrilling tripleheader duel with Jäger Stockill at Lombardy Raceway, presented by Pirelli and Motul.
The season finale was set up for a thrilling four-rider shootout between Scott, Stockill, Roman Darby, and reigning champion Michael Galvis, but Galvis would instead choose to sit out the final round after a disqualification in round three at Lombardy.
That made the path to Spain slightly easier for the two main title protagonists, with the lead pair in the year-end standings earning spots at the FIM MiniGP World Final in Valencia this fall.
Scott would carry a 17-point lead over Stockill into the reverse layout of Lombardy, with Darby still in the championship mix albeit 51 points behind the top spot.
The points leader would kick off the tripleheader on the right foot, securing his second career pole position with a blistering Q1 time and new lap record, as Stockill paced Q2 but fell just short of topping the combined timesheets.
That advantage was quickly negated in race one, however, as Stockill grabbed the holeshot from Scott with Darby and Aiden Liem following close behind.
The duo began to stretch their lead on lap two when Scott dove down the inside of Stockill in turn seven, executing a beautiful pass to hit the front and holding off a number of retaliation attempts to squeeze out a crucial race one win.
That would be enough to clinch one of the top-two spots in the championship for Scott and a birth in Valencia in the process, extending a 22-point lead over Stockill in the title fight while Stockill inched closer to a World Final entry of his own.
Race two would prove to be the opposite outcome, as it was Scott who jumped out to an early advantage with Stockill chasing closely behind. The pair would run nose-to-tail for almost the entire race before Stockill made an extraordinary pass of his own, powering around the outside of Scott in turn eight with just over two laps to go and snatching the victory.
That would mathematically secure Stockill’s spot in Spain alongside Scott, leaving the two Team Canada representatives to battle it out for the national championship in the final race of the year with 17 points separating them once again.
Race three on the day and ten on the campaign would be the most straightforward, though, with Stockill taking the lead in turn one and holding off a number of pass attempts from Scott to end the year with a start-to-finish victory.
The win would cut Stockill’s deficit to 12 points in the final tally, but Scott would play the smart game and exit the year with a strong second-place finish and an FIM MiniGP Canada Series championship in the process.
“Jäger got a great start, and I really wanted to try and pass in a few spots but he defended really well, so I just played it smart,” Scott said. “I broke my arm last year and wasn’t able to go [to Valencia], so it’s really cool to get to do it this year.”
The result would cap off an excellent year for Scott, who ends the 2024 campaign with four victories and a top two finish in every single race, moving him past Galvis for the most podiums in series history with 14.
As for Stockill, the season runner-up will end his debut season with victories in four of the last five races and a perfect run of podiums, giving him plenty of momentum as he heads to Valencia alongside Scott in November.
Completing the podium in all three races would be Darby, who was unable to properly challenge for a race win on the day but did more than enough to secure third in the overall championship, taking five consecutive podiums to end the season.
Liem would take a trio of fourth-place finishes, leapfrogging the absent Mateem O’Brien for sixth in the year-end standings and making plenty of progress throughout the tripleheader.
The Team Canada duo will now wait just less than three months before they represent their country on the world stage, with Scott and Stockill heading to the Ricardo Tormo Circuit in Valencia, Spain alongside the last round of the MotoGP season, November 12-14.
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