Podium finish for Ishan at Polo Cup
Pune, Aug. 9: India’s Ishaan Dodhiwala finished on podium in one of the races and missed another in the second race that he participated in at the Polo Cup China round. Putting up an excellent show, the Hyderabad boy stunned one and all with his spectacular performance taking a third spot in the first races of the weekend.
Race 1 saw Ishaan starting from P3 and quickly getting up the order in P2. Unfortunately though, he was bumped into by another driver on the first lap itself which unsettled his car and that pushed him back to fifth position. From there onwards, the young Indian driver made no mistakes and climbed back into the third position. He finished his first ever international outing with a podium position.
Starting fifth on the grid for Race 2, it was an uphill task for Ishaan right from the beginning. Nonetheless, he drove remarkably fast to climb up the order in no time. By the last lap, Ishaan came up all the way to the second spot. Unfortunately though, an incident in the race brought out red flags with just three corners to go. Missing the red flag Ishaan tried to overtake the car in front of him and was therefore was penalised losing his second potential podium in an international setting.
An excited Ishaan said, “It was a completely unknown territory for me here in Polo Cup China. I had to focus on several factors — track, car and most importantly the aggressive Chinese drivers. It is truly an honour to be here in China as the only Indian driver and then taking a podium ahead of most of the local talents here.”
“My strategy right from the beginning was to fully optimise this opportunity handed by Volkswagen Motorsport India — I wanted to concentrate on going faster and staying clean in every session and not get bothered by the Chinese competition. I guess all the track time I have put in back home has paid off now,” he added.