Coimbatore: Chennai teenager Ashwin Datta raced to a standout victory in the MRF F1600 class to set alight the second round of the MRF MMSC fmsci Indian National Racing Championship at the Kari Motor Speedway, here on Saturday.
He later snapped up another podium in Formua LGB F1300 class by winning Race 2 that saw some hectic scrap for positions.
Ashwin enjoyed an untroubled ride to victory in the first of the three MRF F1600 races scheduled for the weekend. Having started from pole position, Ashwin drove a near-flawless race to win by the proverbial country mile. Behind him, Raghul Rangasamy, hailing from the temple town of Mamallapuram, fought his way to second spot ahead of Chennai’s Nirmal Umashanker. The remaining two races will be run on Sunday.
Comeback racer Arjun Balu had no match as the Coimbatore driver scored a comfortable lights-to-flag victory in the Race 1 of Indian Touring Cars category.
Starting from pole, he gradually built up a sizeable lead with Ashish Ramaswamy of ARKA Motorsports and veteran Vidyaprakash of Prime Racing in tow.
Results: (all 15 laps unless stated):
MRF F1600 (Race 1): 1. Ashwin Datta (Chennai) 15mins, 52.195secs; 2. Raghul Rangasamy (Mamallapuram) 15:59.749; 3. Nirmal Umashanker (Chennai) 16:03.412.
Indian Touring Cars (Race 1): 1. Arjun Balu (Race Concepts) 16:38.541; 2. D Vidya Prakash (Prime Racing) 16:46.128; 3. B Vijay Kumar (Prime Racing) 16:47.238.
Super Stock (Race 1): 1. Varun Anekar (Race Concepts) 22:43.752; 2. Deepak Ravikumar (Infinite Piston) 22:45.806; 3. K Srinivas Teja (Performance Racing) 22:48.777.
Indian Junior Touring Cars (Race 1): 1. Chrys D’Souza (Unimek Racing) 22:54.799; 2. Prabhu AS (ARKA Motorsports) 22:57.507; 3. Nikunj Vagh (Team N1) 23:01.287.
Esteem Cup (Race 1): 1. Vinod S (Team N1) 22:50.081. (Only one finisher).
Formula LGB 1300:
Race 1: 1. Sohil Shah (MSport) 19:20.665; 2. Nabil Hussain (MSport) 19:21.179; 3. A Balaprasath (DTS Racing) 19:22.636.
Race 2: 1. Ashwin Datta (Momentum Motorsports) 17:32.137; 2. Rupesh Sivakumar (MSport) 17:51.678; 3. Nabil Hussain (MSport) 17:55.093.
