Rally of Coimbatore flagged off: Blueband Sports INRC Round 2

Coimbatore, 29 July 2022: The Rally of Coimbatore, the second round of the Blueband Sports fmsci Indian National Rally Championship 2022 (INRC) for four wheelers was flagged off here on Friday.

The second round organised by Coimbatore Auto Sports Club (CASC) has attracted 54 entries. INRC, one of the popular Nationals in the Federation of Motor Sports Clubs of India (fmsci) calendar returns after a long break for Round 2. The first round was held in Chennai in April.

The delayed 2021 season, was completed in March 2021 with the MMSC South India Rally (SIR) which was run along with the APRC Asia event. Karna Kadur and co-driver Nikhil Pai, won their maiden APRC event. The MRF duo are leading the 2022 season Overall table.

Chennai, also hosted the first round of the Blueband INRC Round 1, a month later in April 2022, and after tough fight Arka Motorsports Karna Kadur, in MRF colours, overcame the challenge from Dean Mascarenhas and co-driver Gagan Karumbaiah to take the overall lead in the 2022 championship.

Arka Motorsports’ Karna Kadur (Nikhil Pai) will spearhead the MRF Tyres campaign in the top INRC class along with defending champion Aditya Thakur and co-driver Virender Kashyap, who moved up to INRC 2 this year. Both are leading their respective classes after Round 1. Thakur and Kashyap, the Chettinad Sporting duo, competed in the INRC-3 class in 2021 and won the Overall honours.

The JK Tyre team is led by Arjuna Awardee and seven-times INRC Champion, Gaurav Gill (co-driver Musa Sherif) in a Mahindra XUV 300. However, with Amittrajit Ghosh,  moving abroad, and missing the Round 1, talented rallyist from Mangalore Dean Mascarenhas (co-driver Gagan Karumbaiah) gets an upgrade to the premier INRC class. He will be driving a rally-spec Baleno R2. Ghosh’s navigator and top rallyist Ashwin Naik, who also missed Round 1, will be calling notes for Rohan Pawar of Team Slideways Industries in a INRC2 Polo.

Others to watch out for in INRC are, former champion Chetan Shivram, who is back with his brother Dilip Sharan, with whom he won the title in 2019, and Mandovi Racing’s Arjun Rao and Sathish Rajagopal. Veteran navigator and former champion BS Sujith Kumar makes a comeback (INRC) and will be calling the pace notes for Monish in a VW Polo 1.2GT. Arka Motorsports’ Dhruva Chandrasekhar and PVS Murthy complete the six-car INRC class.

In INRC2 class, JK Tyre’s Fabid Ahmer and co-driver Sanath G, who lost by a whisker last year, will be fighting with defending champions Adity Thakur (Kashyap) once again. Aroor Vikram and AG Somayaa of Snap Racing along with Suhem Kabir (Coorg) and co-driver Jeevarathinam will be the other experienced drivers in INRC2.

Talented Jahaan Singh Gill, who lost in scrutiny after winning on the ground in Round 1, will be in JK colours in INRC3 class along with Kuber Sharma and co-driver Kunal Kashyap INRC-3 victory. The class will have also have strong representation from women in motorsports. Pragathi Gowda and co-driver Trisha Alonka, Davangere doctors Shivani Pruthvi and co-driver Deepti Pruthvi, along with Shivani Parmer and her mom Dr Vani Parmar will all vie for honours in INRC3 class. Another talented driver Anushriya Gulati of Formula Woman fame (DB motorsports) will have Arjun Dheerendra as co-driver. Athira Murali, another talented lady driver from Kerala, will be missing from the line-up for this round.

There will be only three Gypsy entries this time around. The Gypsy class in a non-championship support class.

Note. Feature image caption was corrected on 30July2022.