Gill grabs opening round lead
Defending champion Gaurav Gill took the early lead in the opening round of the Indian National Rally Championship after Day 1 of the MRF 40th South India Rally in Sriperumbudur near Chennai here on Saturday.
Gill and Musa Sherif survived an early scare with the brakes on his Super XUV 500 before coming into his own and winning the last four stages. The Team Mahindra Adventure pair needed just 44 minutes and 35 seconds to complete the day’s five stages. As many as five drivers are however, within striking distance.
INRC 2 competitors, Younus Ilyas and Harish Kumar were snapping on their heels all the way, taking second place with an impressive 45: 39.5, a a little over a minute behind Gill.
Karna Kadur and Nikhil V. Pai and Amittrajit Ghosh and Ashwin Naik took the third and fourth places with Ghosh complaning of overheating issues all day, while Dean Mascarenhas and Shruptha Padival and Arjun Rao and Satish Rajagopal finished the day fifth and sixth. All of them took less than a minute and a half more than Gill.
The day itself began with a tiny surprise. Veteran rallyist Vicky Chandhok took advantage of his knowledge of the MMRT to upstage a 31- strong field of young drivers in the special stage on tarmac. Chandhok, making a comeback after 18 years at age 61, cracked the course in two minutes flat, three seconds faster than even Gill.
Gill, however, took the setback in his stride as his vehicle is not suited for the race track, and reclaimed the advantage in the next stage itself. He tackled the turns and jumps in about 22 kilometres away at Aavisa, in aggressive manner, to finish two seconds earlier than the rest. He kept improving in each stage to widen the gap as the day progressed.