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Aaroh Ravindra from Rayo Racing continued his domination in the senior category of the Meco FMSCI National Rotax Karting Championship in Bengaluru. The Mumbai racer finished ahead of his Rayo Racing team-mate Aanjan Patodia, who put in a brilliant performance to come from last, all the way up to finish second.
Earlier in the weekend, it was Faridabad's Manav Sharma from BPC Racing who qualified on pole with a lap time of 55.384 seconds, ahead of Chennai's Nirmal Umashankar from M Sport. Aanjan Patodia of Pune was third while National Championship leader Aaroh could only manage fourth with a time 55.677 seconds, thanks to the ultra-competitive grid on the top.
Heat 1 was a Rayo Racing 1-2 finish with Aaroh leading Aanjan and Nirmal rounding out the top 3. The clouds let loose and heavy showers saw Heat 2 postponed to Sunday morning and the results remained exactly the same as Heat 1. The crucial pre-finals, which also count for championship points, was a disaster for Aanjan. Aaroh started on pole and soon opened up a small lead ahead of Nirmal. Aanjan was third when suddenly he lost power and had to come into the pits. His bad luck continued as his chain snapped once he got back onto track. Aaroh luckily had no issues and won comfortably.
The finals once again saw Aaroh dominate strongly. He soon opened a commanding lead as Manav managed to get ahead of Nirmal at the start. The duo fought tooth and nail, before Nirmal could regain second, while Aaroh continued to pull away. Aanjan who had to start last, was quickly overtaking racer after racer and was soon on the tail of Manav. He found a way past Manav but Nirmal proved tougher to overtake.
Aanjan waited a couple of laps and planned his move well to get past Nirmal after the hairpin. By then, Aanjan's team mate was over 6 seconds ahead and both settled into a good rhythm. At the end of 20 Laps Aaroh took the chequered flag first, around the 1.2km Kartopia circuit and claimed a hat trick of wins in the National Championship. Aanjan was second making it another 1-2 finish for Rayo Racing while Nirmal came in third.
The Junior category saw numerous ups and downs for some racers. The final was interrupted by rain which meant that all racers had to change to wet tyres. Ultimately it was Bengaluru's Yash Aradhya from M Sport who triumphed ahead of team mates - Sai Sanjay T from Salem and Aditya Swaminathan also from Bengaluru. The Micro Category had all Bengaluru racers triumph with Arjun Rajiv of Peregrine Racing win, ahead of Birel Art's Ruhaan Alva and Saathvik Raju of Peregrine.
"It has been a good weekend for me, especially since the entire grid is so competitive. It was unfortunate that Aanjan was not able to challenge me in the finals from the beginning otherwise it would have been a lot more exciting. A very big thank you to everyone at Rayo Racing especially Steve, for all the hard work put in. I hope I can continue the momentum for the other events" said a contented Aaroh at the end of the event. Rayo Racing finish 1-2 in Senior Category in Bengaluru
