India to host off-road race event Rain Forest Challenge

One of the world's premier off-road race event Rain Forest Challenge will be staged in the tropical rainforest of Western Ghats in August, this year.
The event will be an 10-day affair starting August 7.
More than 50 Indian and foreign participants are likely to take part in the inaugural Indian edition with the maximum slots being opened to country's motor-sport enthusiasts.
India will join Malaysia, where the event was launched in 1997, along with other nations like Italy, Sri Lanka, Australia, China and Russia.
"First time India, the Asian giant is joining the event. I hope that it would be a grand success," said Rain Forest Challenge (RFC) founder Luis J A Wee during the launch of India chapter of the event.

"First year the event will be in Western India. Recce is going and the exact venue of the event will be announced shortly," said founder of Coughar sport Ashish Gupta, whose company have been entrusted with the responsibility of organizing the Indian leg of the adventure sport event.

"In the first year, we can't allow more than 50 participants. But I can assure that upto 40 slots will be reserved for Indian participants," Gupta said during the media interaction.
The 10-day event will comprise of four stages- "Prologue", "Predator", "Terminator" and the final stage of "Twilight Zone".
First couple of days of the event will be for scrutiny of the vehicles followed by the Prologue stage which is purely meant for the spectators.

The Race will then move through the Predator and Terminator stage, finally ending after the Twilight Zone.
In the past, motorsports events in the country have faced customs related issues during importing the logistics. But organizers believe that this would be sorted out with the respective authorities.
"We will look into the customs related problem. But when government is not interested in assisting the Formula One, then what can we expect," said SPS Garcha, Regional Director of Federation of Motorsports Clubs of India (FMSCI)
Event of this kind involves a lot of safety and security management and the organizers are hopeful that they will get the necessary support from the Government.

"This event does not need support of huge magnitude. What we need is small and we will manage it," said Wee.