Chennai, 6 July 2018: Satyanarayana Raju (Gusto Racing) from Hyderabad turned in a brilliant performance to win the Pro-Stock 301-400cc class race in the second round of the MRF MMSC fmsci Indian National Motorcycle Racing Championship at Irungattukottai, near here, on Friday.
Riding the KTM RC 390, Raju, a 20-year old Computer Science student, who won the championship last year in the Honda CBR 150 category, authored a lights-to-flag victory that underlined his absolute dominance in the six-lap race that saw him lead a 1-2 finish for his team, Gusto Racing, with last year’s champion in this category, Kozhikode’s Amarnath Menon coming in second ahead of local challenger Prabhu Arunagiri (Team Alisha Abdullah).
Reflecting on the race, Raju, who also posted the fastest lap of the race (01:54.744) that bettered his pole-winning time of 01:55.425 in the qualifying earlier today, said: “I had a good start and really pushed over the first three laps to open up a comfortable gap. Thereafter, I eased a bit, not wanting to crash like I did in the first round last month. Yeah, it feels good and I must also compliment the MRF slick tyres which worked quite beautifully today with good grip, especially through the corners.”
While Raju vanished into the distance, behind him, Menon fought to hold off Prabhu while behind them, battle raged on for minor positions in an entertaining race.
Earlier, in the premier Super Sport Indian 165cc class qualifying run, it was a familiar story of defending champion Jagan Kumar of TVS Racing easing his way to pole position with a scorching lap of 01:55.625 which, incidentally, was his best effort at the MMRT.
Second on the grid for Saturday’s Race 1 was arch-rival Rajiv Sethu of Idemitsu Honda Ten10 Racing who timed 01:55.952, ahead of Deepak Ravikumar, also of TVS Racing (01:57.041). Championship leader KY Ahamed (TVS Racing) who was the quickest in yesterday’s free practice session could only put in just three laps due to dust in the carburettor, finished fifth in 01:57.674 behind Sarath Kumar of Idemitsu Honda Ten10 Racing (01:57.516).
Others qualifying for pole positions in their respective categories were:
Pro-Stock 165cc: Mithun Kumar (Idemitsu Honda Ten10 Racing, 02:06.163). Novice (165cc): Alexander AS (Sparks Racing) (02:09.323). Girls: Sruthi Nagarajan (Apex Racing Academy) (02:15.891). Idemitsu Honda India Talent Cup 2018 organised by MMSC: Anish D Shetty (Hubballi) (02:05.032). Novice (CBR 150): Kritik Vasan Habib (Karnataka) (02:13.568). TVS One-Make Championship – Open (Apache RR310): Yashas RL (Bengaluru) (02:01.629). Novice (Apache RTR 200): Karthik Mateti (Hyderabad) (02:15.511). Girls (Apache RTR 200): Anne Jennifer (Chennai) (02:19.920).
Results (Provisional):
Pro-Stock (301-400cc) Race 1 (6 laps): 1. Sathyanarayana Raju (Gusto Racing) (11mins, 38.079secs); 2. Amarnath K Menon (Gusto Racing) (11:39.897); 3. Prabhu Arunagiri (Team Alisha Abdullah) (11:40.966).
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