Evo India

TATA PRIMA TRUCK RACING

As Tata Motors prepares for its fourth season of truck racing, we catch up with Vicky Chandhok on training the new crop of highway-to-speedway truckers

- WORDS by JEHAN ADIL DARUKHANAW­ALA & PHOTOGRAPH­Y by ADITYA BEDRE

We catch up with Vicky Chandhok and bring you all the updates for the 2017 season

IWAS LUCKY ENOUGH TO witness the sheer might and presence these mastodons exuded when they hurtled down the straight of the Buddh Internatio­nal Circuit for the third season of the Tata T1 Prima Truck Racing championsh­ip. The third running of the event was witness to a fantastic initiative for Indian highway truckers where they were moulded into truck racing drivers with the help of the MMSC.

Now in its fourth season, Tata has persevered to inculcate more of the same racing mentality into newer generation­s of highway drivers while ensuring the previous batch continue their training. Hence this year at the Tata Racing Program (TRP) 2.0, 214 new drivers joined the previous sixteen in order to get the 2017 batch ready.

The race structure for 2017 is changed a bit. While there were two races for the drivers from the British Truck Racing Associatio­n (BTRA) and two races for the Indian ones, this year-round there will be just three races in all. The internatio­nal drivers will be part of the mega finale race with two separate categories for the Indian racers – the Championsh­ip class comprising of the 2016 batch and the Super class to be filled with the newly trained drivers. Each of these Indian races will feature ten drivers now instead of six, adding to the excitement.

Devised by Karun Chandhok and vetted by Aditya Patel, the TRP 2.0 began early January with the 214 hopefuls taking to the track in Tata Xenons for level one. The basics of track driving knowledge was taught to them. A more detailed level two featured the Tata Ultras, with the race-ready Primas coming in for the final two levels.

“It has been a hectic 40 days of training. We wanted to bring new Indian drivers to the fore and invited our previous ones to be a part of it as well. The training team of national champions led by Aditya have done a fantastic job yet again. We are on the verge of finalising the final 16 Super class drivers who will undergo a final training session in the first week of March at the BIC,” said Vicky Chandhok.

Vicky is optimistic of the new lot doing well. “This year we have made use of the race-spec Prima instead of the stock one as there are quite a lot of changes in the two. Hence the new driver knows what it is to drive in a full racing seat with harnesses in place, even if he doesn’t qualify for the other rounds. We have also fitted these Primas with a passenger seat for training as the trainers can guide the drivers better while out on the track itself,” added Vicky.

The new 2017 Primas have received few updates which will make them slightly faster. While the rubber from JK Tyres remains the same as last year, the tyre degradatio­n is lesser than in previous seasons. The trucks now come with a three-way adjustable Ohlins unit for better tuning. The trucks have also been lowered which increases downforce and reduces the overall centre of gravity of the vehicle. But apart from the above there aren't any other significan­t changes done to the Prima.

The final round of selection process takes place from March 3 wherein the 16 Super and 16 Championsh­ip class drivers will get a taste of the Buddh. Six drivers from each class will then be eliminated, and ten from each group will qualify further, giving us our 20 Indian drivers for the season.

If you want to see these trucks in action, make sure to head out to the Buddh Internatio­nal Circuit on March 18-19 and get ready for some truckin'! ⌧

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