Lohitt Urs and his co-driver
Shrikanth Gowda expectedly won the title in the FIA Asia Cup category besides
emerging National champions even as Gaurav Gill (co-driver Musa Sherif) took
the Overall crown in the Coffee Day India Rally which concluded in Chikkamagaluru
in Karnataka on December 13, 2015.
Mysorean Urs, driving the
Mitsubishi Evo VIII, destroyed the Asia Cup field with relative ease despite
encountering set-up problems on the previous day which cost him some time.
Having registered for the
FMSCI Indian Rally Championship, Urs collected sufficient points to win the
title despite finishing Overall second behind Gill who ended an otherwise
wretched season on a high, but lost his National crown.
“I am obviously delighted to
win the Asia Cup and the National championship. We had some problems with the
car early on, but we managed to set things right,” said Urs.
Reflecting on his performance,
Gill, who scored the second win of the IRC season, said: “It has not been the
best of seasons for me with so many non-finishes. I am of course disappointed
to lose my National title, but feel good to finish the season on a high. We
lost some 40 seconds yesterday due to mechanical problems. However, we managed
to put it all behind us and win here.”
For Team Yokohama, it was a
double delight as Bengaluru pair of Rahul Kanthraj and his co-driver Vivek
Bhatt came out on top in the IRC 2000 class and also sealed the championship in
their category, as did Karna Kadur (co-driver Vivek Ponnusamy) in the IRC 1600
category.
While it was smooth sailing
for Kanthraj who thus completed a clean sweep by winning all the four IRC
rounds, Kadur was a bit lucky as overnight leader Dean Mascarenhas (Shanmuga
SN) was docked a one-minute penalty for early check-in at a Time Control and
thus finished second.
Also, IRC 1600 championship
leader Dr Bikku Babu retired on Saturday (Dec 12) and it paved the way for
Kadur’s triumph. “Not the way I wanted to win the championship with Dr Babu
retiring and Dean getting a penalty which helped me. But, it is nice to win
considering that we had issues with the car through the weekend,” said Kadur.
The three-day event, which was
also a contender for a round of the 2016 Asia Pacific Rally Championship, was
supported by Karnataka Toursim and Indian Oil.
PROVISIONAL
CLASSIFICATIONS:
FIA Asia Cup: Lohit Urs / Srikanth Gowda (Pvt, Evo VIII) 1 (2hrs,
14 mins, 11.2 secs); Satyan Kochar / Amit Wagchoure (Pvt. VW Polo) 2 (02:32:13.2);
Pradeep RG / Shekar 3 (Pvt, Evo VIII) 3 (02:37:22.5).
IRC (Overall): Gaurav Gill / Musa Sherif 1 (Mahindra Adventure, XUV
500) 1 (02:06:18.6); Lohitt Urs / Srikanth Gowda (Pvt, Evo VIII) 2
(02:06:34.2); Amittrajit Ghosh / Ashwin Naik (Mahindra Adventure, XUV 500) 3
(02:07:08.5).
IRC 2000: Rahul Kantharaj / Vivek Y Bhatt (Team Yokohama, Cedia) 1
(02:11:16.0); Younus Ilyas / Paul Thomas (Pvt, Cedia) 2 (02:12:09.4); Sumit
Punjabi / Shahid Salman (Pvt, Cedia) 3 (02:12:44.1).
IRC 1600: Karna Kadur / Vivek Ponnusamy (Team Yokohama, VW Polo) 1
(02:07:29.3); Dean Mascarenhas / Shanmuga SN (Pvt, VW Polo) 2 (02:08.08.5);
Bopaiah KM / Karumbaiah KS (Pvt, VW Polo) 3 (02:09:58.6).
FMSCI Cup 1600: Druva Chandrasekhar / Jeevarathinam J (Pvt, Honda
City V-Tec) 1 (02:10: 45.5); Adith KC / Harish KN (Pvt, Honda City V-Tec) 2
(02:12:46.5); Michu Ganapathy / Venu Ramesh Kumar (Pvt, Maruti Baleno) 3
(02:15:01.4).
Source: COFFEE DAY
INDIA RALLY