Champion at last

Karminder Singh wins 2017 Ameo Cup in a thrilling finale

THE FINAL ROUND OF THE MRF MMSC National racing championship took place from September 15 to 18 at the MMRT in Chennai, with champions being crowned in all the classes. Anindith Reddy won the MRF F1600 class, youngster Arya Singh won the Formula LGB 1300, in the touring car championship Arjun Narendran took top honours in the national championship while Karminder Singh bagged the top spot in the one-make Volkswagen Ameo Cup. Here is all the action from the weekend:

ITC

In the Indian Touring Cars class, it was championship leader Deepak Paul Chinnappa who put up the fastest time in his Honda City, followed by Arjun Narendran in P2 and his Red Rooster teammate Ashish Ramaswamy in P3. The times were really close — all three of them were within a tenth of a second. However a brake failure for Deepak meant Arjun won race 1, with Ashish in second and D Vidyaprakash in third. The second race finished in the same order, as Chinnappa started seventh on the grid and couldn’t work through the traffic before the chequered flag came out. He finished fourth, and that allowed Arjun to make up points and successfully defend his championship title. MRF F1600

Sandeep Kumar won the first race of the weekend after starting on pole, with Keith DeSouza and Arya Singh finishing second and third resepctively. Championship leader, Anindith Reddy didn’t finish the race — a collision took the rear wing off his car — but sealed the title nevertheless, and earned him a ticket to the Mazda Road to Indy shootout. Sandeep dominated over the rest of the weekend as well, winning both the other races but had to settle for second place in the championship. Anindith and Arya finished second and third resepctively in race 2, while Arya finished second in race 3 with Keith in third.

Ameo Cup

Saurav Bandyopadhyay set the fastest time in qualifying to put himself on pole, and Anning Sun, a guest racer from China joined him on the first row. Karminder only managed to qualify eighth on the grid. Nevertheless, the top eight racers were separated by just a second. Saurav finished in the lead, with Anning Sun in second while Sandeep Kumar finished third. Karminder finished seventh, but started the next race in P2, thanks to a reverse grid start. He got off to a good start, and dominated the race till the finish. This was the first wet race of the season and Sandeep brought his car home in second while Affan Sadat who had started on pole finished third.

The win saw Karminder clinch the championship with one race to go. Anning Sun won race 3 from Karminder and Dhruv Mohite. Sandeep finished second in the championship, followed by Dhruv Mohite in third. ⌧