Gill champ again; Ghosh tops INRC

Gaurav Gill (co-driver Musa Sherif) notched his second consecutive outright victory when he topped the Mahindra Adventure Rally of Maharashtra while Amittrajit Ghosh (Ashwin Naik) won the INRC class title here Sunday, the results replicating those of the first round of the Indian National Rally Championship (INRC) run in Chennai earlier this year.

Team Mahindra Adventure's Gill, driving a modified XUV 500, thus made another emphatic statement of his status as India's best rally driver even as he comfortably vanquished Malaysia's former Production World Rally champion Karamjit Singh (Jagdev Singh) who was the second quickest overall.

Driving a Volkswagen Polo for Slideways Industries team, the 51-year old Karamjit, while over a minute adrift of Gill, won the title in the Indian Rally Championship class.

Ghosh, piloting a Group N-spec Mitsubishi Cedia, held off a late surge by his former Red Rooster team-mate Vikram Mathias (Srikanth Gowda) who finished second overall ahead of Arjun Rao (Satish Rajagopal) who, however, won the 1600cc class.

Ghosh also topped the 2000cc class with Mathias in second place while Bangalore duo of Rahul Kanthraj and co-driver Vivek Bhatt completed the podium.

The Junior INRC class saw a dramatic change in overnight positions as leader Suhem MK (Jeevarathinam), winner of the opening round in Chennai, dropping out after the day's first Special Stage while his retirement saw Asad Khan (Zayne Asrar) finishing first, ahead of Anirudha Ranganekar (Nitin Jacob) and Rohan Pawar (Arjun Mehta).

Unofficial final classification:

INRC - Overall: Amittrajit Ghosh / Ashwin Naik (Group N Mitsubishi Cedia) 1 (1hr, 28mins, 16.0secs); Vikram Mathias / Srikanth Gowda (Group N Cedia) 2 (1:28:45.0); Arjun Rao / Satish Rajagopal (VW Polo) 3 (1:31:01.0).

INRC 2000cc: Ghosh / Naik 1; Mathias / Gowda 2; Rahul Kanthraj / Vivek Bhatt (Group N Cedia) 3 (1:31:25.0).

INRC 1600cc: Rao / Rajagopal 1; Raghunandan B / Suraj K (Honda City) 2 (1:33:17.0); Byram Godrejt / Prajval Pai (VW Polo) 3 (1:33:51.0).

Junior INRC: Asad Khan / Zayne Asrar (Maruti Esteem) 1 (1:36:12.0); Anirudha Ranganekar / Nitin Jacob (VW Polo) 2 (1:39:57.0); Rohan Pawar / Arjun Mehta (Slideways Industries, VW Polo) 3 (1:43:46.0).

SUV NRC: Gaurav Gill / Musa Sherif (Mahindra Adventure, XUV 500) 1 (1:26:29.0); Lohitt Urs / Bonnie Thomas (Mahindra Adventure, XUV 500) 2 (1:46:12.0).

IRC: Karamjit Singh / Jagdev Singh (Slideways Industries, VW Polo) 1 (1:27:40.0); Sumit Punjabi / Dr S Dinesh (Cedia) 2 (1:46:00.0).