C S Santosh makes strong start at Desert Storm

C S Santosh, riding for Hero MotoSports Team, made a solid start in the Maruti Suzuki Desert Storm 2018 by closing the first day on top of the pecking order.

Santosh, who opened the first special section, made a blazing run to complete the 86.5 km special in a good time of 1 hour and 10 minutes to finish the Leg 1 of the rally in the lead.

Santosh made good of the new Hero 450 RR bike as well his own experience to fight off competition from the international and domestic riders.

The leg was split into two special stages of 41 km and 46 km respectively, with the first offering a perfect warm-up to the riders on hard pack surface and the second taking the challenge a notch higher with a mix of hard pack and sandy patches along with a fair bit of night riding thrown in the mix to make it more interesting for the riders.

The second leg will task the riders with 496 km run stage comprising 136 kms of special stages, all in desert riding conditions, from Bikaner to Jaisalmer.

Santosh said: "Today was the first day of the Desert Storm with two short stages, the second one being a night stage. It was really fast from the word go and I tried to give it my best.

"Overall I had a pretty good first day with everything working well for me. Looking forward to some good racing over the next few days.