Source: Timesofindia.com

Bangalore (24 Nov, 2009): At a time when rallying in the country is struggling to stay afloat, the sport was handed a hammer blow when Team MRF Tyres, which won the top three spots in the Coffee Day Rally of Chikmagalur on Sunday evening, was excluded from the final classification as its cars failed to comply with a few technical specifications.

Gaurav Gill (co-driver Musa Sherif) brought the car back home to a thunderous applause from the
Reds crew at the service park at Birur on Sunday evening, but the Reds saw red when a protest by their rivals, Red Rooster Racing, was upheld late in the night.

Red Rooster, who didn’t run both their cars on the final day of the Speed-INRC’s season-finale on Sunday, had protested that the Cedia cars used by Gill, Lohitt Urs (Srikanth Gowda) and Arjun Rao Aroor (Sathish Rajagopal) — who had finished on the podium — in the 2000cc (N+) category, flouted rules by using illegal parts.

The protest was upheld in the stewards meeting later in the day, meaning that MRF had indeed used illegal parts. MRF, obviously hurt at the sudden turnaround, duly lodged an appeal for their exclusion.
No specific date has been set for the hearing, but from what Praneeth Perumal, chairman, Rally Commission (Four-wheeler), Federation of Motor Sport Clubs of India, told TOI on Monday, the hearing is likely to come up at the Indian Motor Sports Appellate Court (IMSAC) on November 28. There is an earlier K-1000 appeal, by Red Rooster Racing against MRF for using more than the specified number of air scoops on the bonnet during the second round of the INRC in August, which is coming for hearing on Nov 28. “We may also take up this MRF appeal on the same day,” said Perumal.

Source: Timesofindia.com

Chikmagalur (Nov 22, 2009): Gaurav Gill (co-driver Musa Sherif) gave himself an early birthday present by clinching a double in the final round of the Speed-Indian National Rally Championships Coffee Day Rally of Chikmagalur here on Sunday. On a hot and humid day, MRF’s Gill, far from being hot behind the wheels, warded off the on-fire Lohitt V Urs (Srikanth Gowda) — his teammate — to cinch his second win of the season and with it his second overall INRC title.

Source: Timesofindia.com

Chikmagalur (21, Nov 2009)

If championship leader Gaurav Gill (co-driver Musa Sherif) was unlucky on the opening day for going in last on a slushy Super Special Stage, he was equally unlucky on Day Two to act as a sweeper on the — slippery — first Special Stage of the fifth round of the Speed-INRC’s Coffee Day Rally of Chikmagalur here on Saturday. His fervent prayers obviously didn’t work as the heavens opened up much before the start. However, that was not a deterrent for the speed demon from Delhi. The Team MRF driver was off the blocks in a flash and although he didn’t finish in a blaze — thanks to gearbox problems — the 27-year-old was perched firmly on top of the leaderboard.

Gunning for his second win here and his second overall title, Gill clocked the fastest times in the first three stages to be 24 seconds ahead of defending champion Vikram Mathias (PVS Murthy) of Red Rooster Racing and teammate Lohitt V Urs (Srikanth Gowda) on an eventful day. Arjun Balu (BS Sujith Kumar) of MRF Tyres and Amittrajit Ghosh (Ashwin Naik) of Red Rooster, both in with a chance to annex the overall crown, are out of the reckoning after failing to finish. While Balu got stuck in the tree stumps after pulling to the left at a sharp right-hander on the third Special Stage, Ghosh ended up in a ditch after his brakes failed in the same Stage.

Ghosh had encountered a problem on the same Stage — run twice — earlier in the day. Winner of the seasonopener in Coimbatore, Ghosh went into a canal after Balu had stopped all of a sudden at the flying finish for some strange reason. Ghosh swerved right, found a canal and drove around 500 yards on it before finding an opening. That seemed to take a tool on his brakes and he crashed out.

Source: timesofindia.com

Nashik (01-Nov-2009):

No surprises, no shocks, no last-minute drama. The final-day script of the Rally of Maharashtra, which also concludes the fourth round of the Speed Indian National Rally Championship , took the predicted route on Sunday.

The overnight leaders were content on holding on to their lead rather than going for anything spectacular, while those trailing looked more keen to finish the race so as to garner as many points before the fifth and last round in Chikmagalur in three weeks time. The only point of interest was that of the overall title, which is still wide open, though MRF’s Gaurav Gill holds a slight edge.

Red Rooster Racing’s Vikram Mathias (co-driver PVS Murthy), who’s also the reigning INRC champion, drove calmly to take his first win of the 2009 season after DNFs (Did Not Finish) in the previous three rounds. Mathias, who held a 16-second lead after the end of Leg One on Saturday, was home in one hour, 23 minutes, 12 seconds, which was one minute, 50 seconds more than the timing clocked by second-placed Arjun Balu (co-driver Sujith Kumar) of Team MRF.

Arjun Rao Aroor (co-driver Satish Rajagopal), also of MRF, finished third. Lohit Urs (co-driver Shrikant Gowda), who were running second, had to retire midway due to a gearbox problem. Red Rooster Racing had another....

Source: TheHindu.com

Nashik (31-10-09):
Vikram Mathias (co-driver PVS Murthy) of Team Red Rooster Racing came up with a stunning drive in his Mitsubishi Lancer Cedia (N+) to grab overall lead in the Speeds Rally of Maharashtra, the fourth round of the Speed-Indian National Rally Championship.

He lost over a minute due to a faulty fuel line, but bounced back strongly to finish 16 seconds ahead of Team MRF’s Lohitt V Urs (Shrikant Gowda) after completing six special stages.

Five of 28 starters, including championship contender Amittrajit Ghosh (Ashwin Naik) of Team Red Rooster Racing, packed up. Ghosh retired in the third special stage when the front right wheel came loose, but will rejoin the rally along with leader Gaurav Gill of Team MRF.

Source: TheHindu.com
KOLKATA (20 Sept 2009):

Gaurav Gill and co-driver Musa Sherif of Team MRF set the fastest time for the third successive day to claim the top spot in the Speed Rally de Kolkata, which concluded with a spectator special stage, at the Kishore Bharati Stadium here on Sunday.

Driving a Mitsubishi Lancer Cedia, Gaurav timed one minute 25 seconds and was two seconds quicker than his challenger Amittrajit Ghosh (co-driver Ashwin Naik) of Red Rooster Racing over two laps of the 1.2-km long circuit. This gave Gaurav the best time in the 2000cc N+ category, and the overall title in the third leg of the Speed-Indian National Rally Championship.

Fastest all the way Gaurav picked up 16 points for being the fastest on all three days of the third leg here and was back among the leaders of the National rally circuit. The 28-year-old Team MRF driver, who has a protest pending against his second place finish in the previous round in Bangalore, will move to the top of the standings unless the protest is upheld.

Source: Timesofindia.com

Durgapur(19-Sept 2009):

Team MRF driver Gaurav Gill was back to his best as he almost sealed the issue on the second day of the third leg of the Speed Indian National Rally Championship (INRC) on Saturday.Gill, who enjoyed a 28-second lead at the end of first day on Friday, extended it to 1 minute 17 seconds over his nearest rival Amittrajit Ghosh of Red Rooster.

With only 1.2 km of Super Special Stage (SSP) remaining to be run at the Jadavpur Stadium on the final day on Sunday, there’s little possibility of any more upsets or change in the drivers’ standings. However, Gill is not ready to count the chickens till it’s hatched. “I am at the finishing line, but yet to cross it,” he said while describing his position on Saturday. “I have a comfortable lead, but you never know till the event is over.”

Gill has already ensured six (3+3) points for being fastest in both the days so far. He stands to gain 10 more points if he wins on Sunday. That will take him to the top of the points table with 29 points after three rounds.The Delhi boy is also quite eager to top this leg as he has not won any event for more than a year now.

Source: Timesofindia.com

Durgapur (18-Sep 2009): Much to the relief of everyone, the sun shone brightly on the first day of the third leg of the Speed Indian National Rally Championship (INRC) here on Friday. That provided the drivers with quite a friendly track, but could not, however, prevent an incident-free day.

About 600m before the finish of the first special stage (SS), Arjun Balu of Team MRF skidded off the track. Vikram Mathias of Red Rooster, who was coming behind him, rammed into his rear. Balu could not recover from the damage and had to withdraw.

Red Rooster team management was not at all amused about the incident, as they felt that the stewards had not informed their driver about the accident. However, Mathias also could not last long and he too skidded off in the third SS. With Mathias out, the onus was on Amittrajit Ghosh to carry on the fight for Red Rooster. The former national racing and rally champion, who started off very cautiously in the initial SS, did push hard in the latter stages and as per the provisional results, he is in the second position, behind day’s leader Gaurav Gill of Team MRF.
   

Source: thehindu.com

Bangalore Aug25 2009: Arjun Balu (co-driver Sujith Kumar) of Team MRF kept his focus and expertly dashed through the two-kilometre long Spectator Special Stage and claimed the overall top honours in the IMG Karnataka-1000 Rally, the second round of the Speed-Indian National Rally Championship here on Sunday.

The 34-year-old Coimbatore ace thus ensured a clean sweep for Team MRF and it was his first big win in four years.

An elated Balu said: “I am happy with my performance, though I weathered a few problems. Since I had a good lead, I decided not to push myself today. For the past few years, some how luck was not on my side. So I was determined to hold my position and once I was in front”.

Gaurav Gill (co-driver Moosa Sherif) who finished overall second was the quickest today. In the overall third position was another Team MRF duo, Aroor Arjun Rao (co-driver Satish Rajagopal).

Source: www.hindu.com

Coimbatore, 28 Jun 2009: It was so near yet so far for Team MRF’s Arjun Rao. The 26-year-old from Mangalore, who enjoyed a slight edge at the start, surrendered the lead and the overall title to Red Rooster Racing’s Amittrajit Ghosh in the Speed-Rally of Coimbatore, the National championship opener, at the makeshift Codissia stages here on Sunday.

Ghosh took things a bit cool in the day’s opening stage (SS9) at the Kethanur windmill farm.“ He just followed our advice but he went way too easy than we expected and lost 19 precious seconds,” said seven-time National champion, N. Leelakrishnan, the team’s tuner.

However, Ghosh did not worry much. He knew he had the ability to catch up with Rao. And, he did it in roaring style bringing the car home in 00:11:53s in the second stage (SS10) as against Rao’s 00:12:11s.

Source: www.Timesofindia.com

Coimbatore (28 June-09): Boulders, ruts and the unusually long distance of 108 kms of special rally stages took its toll on the cars on the first day of the Rally of Coimbatore, the first round of Indian National Rally Championship (INRC), on Saturday.
Of the record 61 cars that were flagged off in the morning, only 31 finished the first leg of 108 kms. Among the dropouts were leading MRF driver Gaurav Gill and defending champion Vikram Mathias of Red Rooster.
On a dramatic day when engine problems led to a series of dropouts as the drivers toiled on the loose soil in and around the windmill farms of Kethannur and Palladam in Coimbatore, outsider Arjun Rao Aroor of Team MRF took a six-second lead over Amittrajit Ghosh of Red Rooster after the eight-stage first leg.
    Team MRF’s two leading drivers Gurav Gill and Lohit Urs crashed out in the first leg. Gill’s engine blew off in the first stage itself while Lohit Urs got himself to lead after two rounds and then dropped out in the third stage with an electrical problem.

Red Rooster's Vikram Mathis won the Overall winner's cup of IMG's Rally of Maharashtra, the final round of INRC 2008, and thus also sealing the overall champiopnship title for 2008.

The Red Rooster driver won by a huge margin of 8m26s from Vikram Devadasan (RSC), who finished a commendable second overall in the rally, after both the 1600 class challengers, G S Joshy and Sanket Shanbhag (below), hit trouble. Also out of the reckoning early on Day 2 was Vikram’s team mate Amitrajit Ghosh, who went out on the first stage of the day when he hit a rock, destroying his suspension.

Ramesh and Sanket Shanbaug stood fourth and Girijashankar Joshi of Winspeed stood fifth in the overall winner category.

In the Gypsy Cup category, Sand  eep Sharma was the winner followed by Suresh Rana and Chettinad Sporting's Sanjay Agarwal at number two & three positions respectively.

In Rally Star Cup category, Chettinad Sproting's Vikram Devadsen got the top position followed by Shailendar Hegde and Godrej Byram at No 2 & 3 respectively.

The leg 2 of the Rally De Coorg was flagged off from Gandhi Maidan at 7 am. 20 competitors battled it out showing their splendid driving skills in the three stages which ran in reverse direction.

Vikram Mathias/PVS Murthy of Red Rooster Racing won the overall title, and also sealed the National Championship, adding one more Championship to his kitty.

Vikram was follwed by Girijashanker Joshi/Prajval Pai of team Winspeed with an impressive run and was second overall as well as the winner in the 1600CC class.

IMG RALLY DE COORG 2008 started off with a colorful flag off at the Ghandhi Maidan, where a large No. of Spectators, Cheered the competing crews. The Stages were smooth and fast and the rain gods blessed us by not showering.

Stage 1 was finished by all competitors and in Stage 2 two competitors dropped off due to mechanical failure. Further through out the 2nd stage to 6th Stage 6 competitors dropped out due to various reasons.

Master ace Vikram Mathias of Red Rooster Racing once again delighted the spectators with a spirited drive and took a good lead on day 1. Mathias, who leads the championship table with 47 points, seemed well on course to clinch the title, topping day one in his Mitsubishi Lancer Cedia with 51 minutes and 29 seconds.

Said Mathias after the first day: “It is a pleasure to be back in competition at Coorg after many years. The last rally here was held in 2001. We are enjoying the stages thoroughly, though they are tight and the smallest mistake may cost us the rally, but I have a very good navigator in PVS Murthy and his calling has been on the dot. Our car is running well, thanks to the effort and co-ordination of the team. With a 3 mins 30 secs lead we should be able to win the rally tomorrow and put Red Rooster racing on the podium again.”

Gaurav Gill from India has won the 2008 Rally of Indonesia by nearly 2 minutes with his MRF Tyres Mitsubishi team-mate Katsu Taguchi second. After being 4.5 seconds off taking the lead Cody Crocker slipped to third after a puncture on Stage 12.

01 Jun 2008 

India’s Naren Kumar battled persistent car problems and rough terrain that saw 26 competitors out of the original 60 fall by the wayside to notch a creditable 10th place finish at his PWRC debut in Greece.

The first Indian to contest a world rally event, Naren and co-driver Nicky Beech overcame a variety of problems with their brand-new Tomi Makinen-prepared Subaru WRX to move up the leaderboard throughout three days of tough conditions on the Greek roads.

20 April 2008: Mysore, India.

H.K.Pradeep of Team TVS Racing won the Apache RTR Rally of Mysore 2008, the with a minute and 8 seconds to spare, astride an Apache RTR. He logged 42.01 penalties.  The 25 year old Executive from Bangalore, who placed overall first in the first rally of the FMSCI INRC 2008, and in the Group B (modified) category, 130-160 cc, is a well known name in the Motorsport world the past 5 years. "I was a little worried when I entered the rally, because I did not participate in any event the whole of 2007(his family was not for it), and I was on a fresh bike, the Apache.

The Asia Pacific Rally Championship is off to a flying start for Japan's Katsu Taguchi who with co-driver Mark Stacey, led from start to finish in the opening round held last weekend in New Caledonia. Driving a MRF Tyres Mitsubishi Lancer Evo 9 prepared by RaceTorque Australia, Taguchi used all his prior knowledge of the very tricky and fast event to establish a handy lead of 43 seconds on his new Australian team-mate Scott Pedder at the end of the first leg. That gap was extended on Day 2 when Pedder crashed out in the twisty Katrakoin stage leaving Taguchi to cruise to the finish and celebrate his first APRC win in two years.

The Federation of Motor Sports Clubs of India (FMSCI), the National Sports Federation of Government of India & the Indian Federation of the Federation Internationale de Motocyclisme (FIM) is pleased to announce the Indian National Rally Championship (INRC) for motorcycles from the year 2008.

Mr.Praneeth Perumal, Chairman FMSCI 2W Rally Commission said : “ Many rally enthusiasts have been eagerly awaiting this announcement. In the coming years, with the...

“Team SIDVIN India” – The First Indian Team for World Rally Championship announced

January 31, 2008 – Sidvin Core-tech India Pvt. Ltd., a leading Engineering Service provider for Oil & Gas Industry, today introduced the First Indian team for the 2008 FIA World Rally Championship in the Production Class. Making this announcement here at a press conference, Mr. Mohan Nagarajan – Chairman & Managing Director - Sidvin Core-Tech India Pvt. Ltd. said that the team will be called “Team Sidvin India” (TSI).

The significance of this announcement can be gauged