Chennai, 29 Aug 2018: The Indian National Motorcycle Racing Championship organised by Madras Motor Sports Club (MMSC) resumes after a seven-week break with the fourth round at the MMRT track at Irungattukottai, near here from Friday. The bike races will be run concurrently with Formula 4 South-East Asia Championship, the only FIA event being held in India after Formula One left in 2013.
In another welcome move which takes two-wheeler racing in the country to the next level, National championship sponsors MRF have decided to issue slick tyres to the Pro-Stock (165cc) category in addition to Super Sport Indian (165cc) class and the Pro-Stock 301-400cc category competitors who used these tyres in the previous round.
The MRF slick tyres have been received well by the competitors whose performance graph moved upwards after changing from the normal tyres to slicks which afforded far better grip leading to higher cornering speed which in turn reflected in the lap timings.
The premier Super Sport Indian (165cc) class will yet again be the main focus with Idemitsu Honda Ten10 Racing and TVS Racing riders locked in a titanic battle. Young Rajiv Sethu (Honda) heads the leaderboard with 70 points following a brilliant double in the previous round, ahead of TVS Racing’s defending champion Jagan Kumar (62) and his team-mate KY Ahamed (58).
Gusto Racing riders, Amarnath Menon (72) and Satyanarayana Raju (61) are sitting pretty in the Pro-Stock 301-400cc class, having won between them three of the four races so far while Bengaluru-based Anish D Shetty (Idemitsu Honda Ten10 Racing), with three wins in four starts, heads the Pro-Stock (165cc) category with 93 points, well clear of second-placed Kevin Kannan (60) of Rockers Racing.
In the Novice class (Stock 165cc), which has again attracted over 50 entries, Sparks Racing’s Aditya Rao Immeneni and Karthik Mateti tied on 43 points with one win apiece while in the Girls (165cc) category, it has been an Ann Jennifer show with the Chennai-based Sparks Racing rider winning both the races so far to be firmly in front.
The weekend will also see races for Novice riders in the Idemitsu Honda India Talent Cup 2018 (CBR 150) organised by MMSC and the TVS One-Make Championship (Apache RTR 200) categories.
