Fourth win for Vishnu as Armaan sparkles

While Vishnu Prasad won his fourth consecutive race this season in the JK FB02 category, it was Armaan Ebrahim who gave a brilliant exhibition of race craft to climb from last to second in the JK Tyre Racing Championship at the wind and rain-swept Kari Motor Speedway here Saturday.

The 20-year-old Prasad, who had won all three races in the first round last month here, led from start to finish, while Ebrahim, starting last on the grid, cut through the field to come in second. However, his position will not be counted as he is a guest driver along with fellow international Aditya Patel, who was sixth.

Ebrahim, only 24 but with vast experience in Formula racing, and racing in India after a 10-year break, had little problem making his way up the grid in the 15-lap race before he got bogged down behind Ananth Shanmugam. The duo fought till the last lap when Ebrahim came up with a brilliant overtaking move in the slow left-right "Mickey Mouse" corner to finish second.

With Ebrahim's position not counting, Shanmugam took the second spot ahead of Nayan Chatterjee while former national champion Patel squeezed out a sixth place finish after a poor start and getting stuck in traffic.

"It was fun to drive here after 10 years and I was impressed with the quality of drivers," said Ebrahim, whose race craft had other competitors awestruck.

Meanwhile, Bangalore's Sudarshana Rao, second behind Diljith Shaji in the previous three races, finally managed to win the Formula LGB 4 race where he started third.

Rao fought and won an intense battle with Shaji, who spun after leading initially, and then with Sarosh Hataria, who too did a 360-degree turn on a slippery track. Finishing behind Rao were Vishnu Prasad and Raghul Rangaswamy.

The second race in this class that was run in rain saw the winner Sarosh Hataria being docked 30 seconds because of a penalty by the stewards for overtaking before the start-finish line when the Safety Car, which was deployed following a first lap incident, came out.

Consequently, Vishnu Prasad was elevated from second to first with Diljit Shaji second and Raghul Rangaswamy third.

Karthik Tharani took the honours in the VW Polo R Cup race that was stopped following a 10th lap incident and restarted. Anshul Manoj Singh came in second ahead of Karminder Singh, who benefited when championship leader Angad Singh Matharoo was penalised 30 seconds for an infringement.

The results:

JK FB02: Vishnu Prasad 1 (16 mins, 40.777 secs); Ananth Shanmugam 2 (16:44.743); Nayan Chatterjee 3 (16:45.477).

Formula LGB 4 (Race 1 - 15 laps): Sudarashana Rao (Dark Don Racing) 1 (18:35.061); Vishnu Prasad (Meco Racing) 2 (18:35.218); Raghul Rangaswamy (Meco Racing) 3 (18:39.521). Race 2: Vishnu Prasad (Meco Racing) 1 (24:57.818); Diljit Shaji (Dark Don Racing) 2 (25:04.747); Raghul Rangaswamy (Meco Racing) 3 (25:06.739).

VW Polo R Cup: Karthik Tharani 1 (19:46.427); Anshul Manoj Shah 2 (19:56.103); Karminder Singh (20:01.126) 3.