Gaurav Gill-Musa Sherif notch up a comfortable win

Coimbatore, 5 August 2018: Indian speed king Gaurav Gill, along with his trusted co-driver Musa Sherif, romped home to a thumping victory in the Rally of Coimbatore, the second round of the Indian national Rally Championship (INRC) as he swept all the special stages winning with ease at the Kethanur windmill farms here on Sunday. He clocked 1:14:30.1 to complete the five Special Stages and won with a clean margin of 1 min 1.1 second.

His teammate Amittrajit (with co-driver Ashwin Naik) has to be content with the second place all through the rally as he appeared to be no match to the leader, but managed to keep his second position. He was off the pace with Gill trailing by 10 to 15 seconds all along and was no threat to Gill at any stage.

The President of the Federation, Akbar Ebrahim claimed the third position in the INRC 1 category, reminding fans and drivers that he has not lost his touch even after nearly 25 years of active rallying.

The 2016 INRC champion, Karna Kadur and co-driver Nikhil V Pai, had to settle for the overall third position as all his efforts to upstage the leaders proved to futile. He managed to claim the INRC 2 category though, making it a 1-2 for Team Arka Motorsports.

His teammate Rahul Kanthraj along with co-driver Vivek Y Bhatt took the second place while Phalghuna Urs and Srikanth Gowda of Snap Racing claimed the third place.

The INRC 3 category too didn’t see any change on the leaderboard with Aroor Vikram Rao and co-driver Anand Somayya of Falkon Motorsports taking a facile win.

Suhem Kabeer and co-driver Jeevarathinam of Team Champions finished second relegating Chetan Shivram and co-driver Rupesh Kholay to the third position on the podium.

Results:

INRC: 1. Gaurav Gill/Musa Sherif (Team Mahindra Adventure; 01:14:30.1); 2. Amittrajit Ghosh/Ashwin Naik (Team Mahindra Adventure; 01:15:31.2); 3. Karna Kadur/Nikhil V Pai (Arka Motorsports; 01:16:24.8).

INRC 2: 1. Karna Kadur/Nikhil V Pai; 2. Rahul Kanthraj/Vivek Y Bhatt (Arka Motorsports; 01:17:36.9); 3. Phalghuna Urs/Srikanth Gowda; Snap Racing; 01:17:40.7).

INRC 3: 1. Aroor Vikram Rao/Anand Somayya (Falkon Motorsports; 01:17:11.8); 2. Suhem Kabeer/Jeevarathinam (Team Champions; 01:17:48.8); 3. Chetan Shivram/Rupesh Kholay (01:17:58.4)

FMSCI 2WD: 1. Adith KC/Suraj K; 2. Suraj Thomas/Sob George; 3. Lokesh Gowda V | Venu Ramesh Kumar.

eom/david