MANGALURU: Kolkata-Mangaluru team of Amittrajit Ghosh-Ashwin Naik respectively finished on top after three rounds of
Indian National Rally Championship
(INRC) in the hilly terrain of
Arunachal Pradesh
on Sunday.
The champs were positioned ninth on Saturday, improved their position to third overnight and jumped to the top on Sunday late afternoon due to some expert steering of Amittrajit and deft navigation by Ashwin.
Driving a Mahindra XUV in the event, the duo only reiterated that their victory in the
European Rally Championship
at Greece earlier this year was not a flash in the pan.
Aiding their move to the top was move by Saturday overnight
Gaurav Gill
pulling out of competition due to a mechanical issue with his car. Combined with this slice of luck and mostly due to the expert rallying tactics Amittrajit and Ashwin made it to the podium at Itanagar.
The ace rallyists had been see sawing between second and third places in sub section 5, 6 and subsection 7, clocking a top time of 00:57:33.6 hours. This was 5.9 seconds faster than INRC second position that Phalguna Urs and Srikanth clocked, giving them the victory. The snap Racing pair, who were hot on Gill’s tail all of Saturday, didn’t have a fruitful second day, managing only two fourth-place and one fifth-place finish in the stages.
Recalling the gruelling drive through the misty mountains, river fringes and dense forests of one of the North Eastern states, Amittrajit said, "Slipping to the ninth position at the beginning of the rally due to a technical issue was weighing on us heavily. But I and Ashwin kept pushing until we managed to bounce back to the pole position," Amittrajit said. On Sunday too, the duo suffered as they lost much time already gained due to change of tyres.
While they changed for extremely wet conditions off the road, the track dried up by the time they were ready to hit the road. "Gaurav Gill might have pulled out which might have worked for us. Iam certain Gaurav will be back with a new resolve in the next two rounds of the Indian National Rally Championship, he is a tough competitor, but we have decided to give him a tough run," Ashwin Nayak said.
RESULTS: INRC: 1. Amittrajit Ghosh/Ashwin Naik (Team Mahindra Adventure; 00:57:33.6), 2. Phalguna Urs/Srikanth (Snap Racing; 00:57:39.5) and 3. Dean Mascarenhas | Shruptha Padival (Team Champions; 00:57:57.7)
INRC 1: 1. Amittrajit Ghosh/Ashwin Naik (Team Mahindra Adventure; 00:57:33.6) 2. Lokesh Gowda/Venu Ramesh Kumar (Team Champions; 01:07:20.8); INRC 2: 1. Phalguna Urs/Srikanth (Snap Racing; 00:57:39.5) 2. Karna Kadur/PVS Murthy (Arka Motorsports; 00:58:37.0) 3. Rahul Kanthraj/Vivek Y Bhatt (Arka Motorsports; 00:58:55.2); INRC 3: 1. Dean Mascarenhas/Shruptha Padival (Team Champions; 00:57:57.7) 2. Aroor Vikram Rao/Somayya AG (Falkon Motorsports; 01:05:17.0) 3. Phurpa Tsering/Chow Tiktha (Phurpa Tsering; 01:14:57.9); FMSCI 2WD CUP: 1. Adith K C/Arjun SSB (Team Champions; 01:01:20.0) 2. Rakshith Iyer/Sagar Mallappa (Rakshith Iyer; 01:10:54.4)
Start a Conversation
Post comment