Classy Anthony West scores a double: ARRC at BIC
New Delhi, 2 October 2016: Two 35-year old veterans, Anthony Keith West (Australia) and Decha Kraisart (Thailand) lit up the Buddh International Circuit on Sunday with a memorable battle before the former took the honours for a double in the SuperSport 600cc class on the concluding day of the fifth round of the Asia Road Racing Championship organized by the Madras Motor Sports Club.
On the home front, Hari Krishnan Rajagopal and Mathana Kumar finished 11thand 15th in the Asia Dream Cup while the third entrant Rajiv Sethu crashed out in the very first lap.
West, in scoring only his second win of the season, exhibited great riding skills and also showcasing his experience of having ridden in various World Championships for 16 seasons, as he won a battle with Kraisart, the former two times champion who matched the Aussie before wilting away in the final stages of the 16-lap race.
Both West and Kraisart, who led briefly in the early stages before getting passed by the Aussie, were in a class of their own while Azlan Shah Kamaruza of Malaysia, who initially ran the front-runners close, came home in third, some six seconds adrift.
The Asia Dream Cup race witnessed a thrilling battle with a bunch of seven riders roaring through the last corner on the last lap before Australia’s Broc Pearson snatched a win.
Hari Krishnan, Sethu and Mathana Kumar, starting in the third and fourth rows, got entangled in the big midfield bunch and never quite broke free to challenge the front runners.
Sethu’s race ended when he lost the front of his bike going into the sweeping parabola and crashed, while Hari Krishnan and Mathana Kumar remained in 12th and 16th positions, but moved up a spot when championship leader Hiroki Nakamura, who was running fifth, crashed in the last lap.
Thailand’s Apiwat Wongthananon on a Yamaha yet again dominated the Asia Production 250cc class by notching his second consecutive win and eighth from 10 starts to seal the championship as he took his tally to 221 points to second-placed Takehiro Yamamoto of Japan who is on 151. With the sixth and last round to be run later this year and a maximum of 50 points at stake, Wongthananon enjoys an unassailable lead.
Ahmad Fazli Sham of Malaysia, astride a Yamaha, won a tight race to complete a double in the Underbone 130cc class to come within three points of championship leader Indonesian Wahyu Ali Trilaksana, also on a Yamaha, who finished a close second, ahead of Md Fairues (Indonesia, Kawasaki).
Trilaksana has 113 points to Sham’s 100 while Md Izzat Zaidi of Malaysia, having finished seventh on a Yamaha, is third on the leaderboard with 107 points, just one ahead of compatriot Md Amirul Arif Musa (Honda).
Ishaan Dodhiwala clinched the title in the Volkswagen Vento Cup despite finishing second behind Karminder Pal Singh in the concluding race of the series while Jeet Jhabak took the crown in the Junior Division.
The results (Provisional):
Asia Road Racing Championship – SuperSport 600cc (Race-2, 16 laps): 1. Anthony Keith West (Australia, Yamaha) (31:03.153); 2. Decha Kraisart (Thailand, Yamaha) (31:06.352); Azlan Shah Kamaruza (Malaysia, Kawasaki) (31:10.691).
Underbone 130cc (Race-2, 7 laps): 1. Ahmad Fazli Sham (Malaysia, Yamaha) (17:17.612); 2. Wahyu Aji Trilaksana (Indonesia, Yamaha) (17:17.733); 3. Md Haziq Md Fairues (Malaysia, Yamaha) (17:17.834).
Asia Production 250cc (Race-2, 9 laps): 1. Apiwat Wongthananon (Thailand, Yamaha) (20:37.809); 2. Sitthisak Onchawiang (Thailand, Honda) (20:38.285); 3. Galang Hendra Pratam (Indonesia, Yamaha) (20:38.364).
Asia Dream Cup (Race-2, 7 laps): Broc Pearson (Australia) (17:01.625); 2. Sittipon Srimoontree (Thailand) (17:02.138); 3. Hafiz Nor Azman (Malaysia) (17:02.540).
MMSC One Make Championship – Honda CBR 250 (Open, Race-2, 5 laps): 1. Abhishek Vasudev (12:52.326); 2. Anish D Shetty (12:52.386); 3. Mathana Kumar (12:52.517).
TVS Apache RTR 200 (Open, Race-2, 5 laps): 1. Shyam Shankar (13:57.809); 2. Prashanth Kumar (13:57.964); 3. Arun Muthukrishnan (13:58.001).
Suzuki Gixxer Cup (Open, Race-2, 5 laps): 1. Aaron Gunawardena (Sri Lanka) (14:07.947); 2. Meka Vidhuraj (14:08.472); 3. Vivian Gladwin (14:08.496).
Volkswagen Vento Cup (Race-2, 8 laps): 1. Karminder Pal Singh (23:34.724); 2. Ishaan Dodhiwala (23:34.994); 3. Rishaad Mody (23:38.416).
About Madras Motor Sports Club
The Madras Motor Sports Club has been the pioneer in developing and promoting motorsport in India since 1953, and we look to further improve in the years to come. It is the club’s endeavor to provide more opportunities for competitors and to this end, it has chalked out a progressive program for 2016. From the days of Sholavaram , MMSC built its own racetrack which was inaugurated in 1979 and secured its FIA Grade-2 international certification in 2015, making it the only club which owns such a facility. The club has organised the Porsche Super Cup, Formula Campos, Formula Asia, Asian touring car championships, Formula 3, Tata Prima Truck racing championship, the Asian 2-wheeler racing championships besides a host of other motorsport events over the years. The club also has active participation for its events from vehicle manufacturers who also use the Madras Motor Race Track (MMRT) extensively for testing their products.
eom/AP Media Communications press release
