Coimbatore : June 21, 2009

The Rally of Coimbatore sponsored by MAK Lubricants from Bharat Petroleum was flagged off today at 0800 hrs from the Kethanur Service Park, Coimbatore. Twenty Seven (27) rally riders took the start and 24 riders finished the same. The first bike finished the rally at 1:24 pm as scheduled. The first round of the MAK FMSCI Indian National Rally Championship for 2 wheelers, promoted by IMG Sports & Pro Sports Promotion, ran like a clockwork from start to the end. The Prize Distribution Ceremony was held in the evening. The event was organized by Coimbatore Auto Sports Club.

The total distance of the rally was 115.23 kms with 85.78 kms of special stages.

Pramod Joshua of TVS Racing astride his TVS Apache RTR was declared the overall winner of the MAK Rally of Coimbatore. Infact it was TVS Racing who stole the show by winning the first 5 places overall. Pramod Joshua clocked the fastest stage timings in all the 6 stages and won the rally with a total penalty of 01:22:49. The second place was won by his team-mate Aravind K.P. (TVS Apache RTR) with 01:24:25, followed by Natraj R (TVS Apache RTR) with a penalty of 01:26:24.

Pramod Joshua said "I am very happy that I had won the first rally of the year, the terrain was excellent. I must say that I had excellent grip from stage 1. If you look at my timings, I was doing all stages in 13+ mins while everyone else were doing 14+. The handling of RTR was excellent and my timings goes to prove that. I am really happy and look forward to the next event in Bangalore"

In the unmodified class (Group D) four stroke upto 130 cc, it was Venu Ramesh Kumar astride his Yamaha YBX, who won with a total penalty of 01:38:53, followed by another Yamaha YBX rider SS Varun with 01:51:03.

In the modified class (Group B) for four strokes upto 130 cc, it was Sunil Kumar P astride his Yamaha YBX, followed by Sachin Singh on his TVS Victor Edge who finished 1st and 2nd respectively.

In the 2 stroke modified class (Group B) 131cc upto 165 cc, it was Harish S on his Yamaha RX 135 who finished first in his class with a total penalty of 01:42:37. Finishing second was David Engelbert and Mohammed Ali finished third. Both were on Yamaha RX 135.

Anil Kumar (TVS Fiero) won the Group D, unmodified class of 131 cc upto 165 cc. Suresh B.V. and Raju G, finished 2nd and 3rd respectively on their TVS Fieros.

In the 4 stroke 260 cc class, while Chetan Ganapathy lead his class upto 5 stages, but in the 6th and final stage, lost time due to some problem with his bike and had to settle for 2nd place. The class was won by Gunasekar S. Both were on the Hero Honda Karizma.

The next round of the Championship will be held on the 15th & 16th August 2009 at Bangalore.

The Calendar for 2009:

The MAK FMSCI INRC for 2 wheelers will be a five round championship as follows:

Round 1: Coimbatore : 20-21 June 2009
Round 2: Bangalore : 15-16 August 2009
Round 3: Mysore : 12-13 September 2009
Round 4: Chikmagalur : 14-15 November 2009 and
Round 5: Chennai : TBA

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