The first round of the Volkswagen Ameo Cup 2017 at the Kari Motor Speedway, Coimbatore saw some close battle between the two potential championship winners. Karminder Singh dominated the first race from start to the finish of the race 1. There was an incident involving Affan Sadat Safwan from Bangladesh with another championship favorite Dhruv Mohite in lap 1. Affan nudged Dhruv from behind at a chicane, which caused a major damage in Affan’s car and that forced him to retire from the race.
On the other hand Avik Anwar started from 8th on the grid, got a good start and made couple of places in the first lap. He was running strong and consistent at 6th position till an incident that brought safety car on the track. During the safety car period two of the cars in front of Avik Anwar overtook a car during the safety car period which led to a 20sec penalty for those two drivers. Right after the safety car period, Avik Anwar was on a hammering performance to chase down Aditya Pawar and finished the race in 4th position after 3rd place holder Aditya Pawar. Only +0.176 was the difference between 3rd and 4th. Despite getting several bumps from the fellow competitors Avik Anwar was hold on to the 4th place and challenged the 3rd spot runner.
Volkswagen Ameo Cup 2017, Round-1, Race 1
- Karminder Singh- 19:34.489
- A Sandeep Kumar- 19:35.336
- Aditya Pawar- 19:46.022
- Tauhid Anwar- 19:46.198
- Dhruv Mohite- 19:46.858
- Anmol Singh- 19:47.470
- Saurav Bandyopadhyay- 19:50.716
- Rohit Goyal- 19:51.859
- Rashad Khan- 19:53.496
- Anosh Khumbatta- 19:56.582
- Jeet Jhabakh- (C)
- Donovan Vaz- (C)
- Johir Suresh- 20:08.537
- Pavneet Sheetal- 20:10.034
- Vedant Agarwal- 20:07.263
- Siddharth Kotecha- +1 Lap
- Benjamin Gracias- DNF
- Affan Sadat- DNF
Fastest Lap: Karminder Singh- 1:09.288
Race 2 was tough race for the Bangladeshi racers. Avik did manage a good starting position for the Race 2 but due to technical error his launch control didn’t work at the start, yet he managed to stay strong in the midfield of the pack. On the other hand due to DNF in the Race 1 Affan started the race from the last place of the grid.
Race 1 leader Karminder Singh immediately found himself behind his rival A Sandeep Kumar at the start. All the attention was on the leading pack consists three cars A Sandeep Kumar, Karminder Singh, and Dhruv Mohite. These 3 drivers were so close to each other that the top three cars were covered within 2 seconds. Race 2 witnessed Karminder Singh’s hunger for winning the race and was engaged into several close battle with the race leader A Sandeep Kumar. Young blood Dhruv Mohite match the leading two while staying in 3rd.
Despite having technical difficulties, and tires grain, Avik Anwar managed to seal the 8th place and Affan finished on 14th.
Volkswagen Ameo Cup 2017, Round-1, Race 2
- A Sandeep Kumar- 18:06.633
- Karminder Singh- 18:07.100
- Dhruv Mohite- 18:08.009
- Jeet Jhabakh- 18:12.686
- Anmol Singh- 18:21.213
- Donovan Vaz- 18:22.512
- Saurav Bandyopadhyay- 18:23.611
- Tauhid Anwar- 18:31.530
- Anosh Khumbatta- 18:40.319
- Rashad Khan- 18:41.259
- Benjamin Gracias- 18:45.492
- Pavneet Sheetal- 18:58.067
- Johir Suresh- 18:59.839
- Affan Sadat- 19:03.613
- Vedant Agarwal- 19:08.949
- Aditya Pawar- +1 Lap
- Siddharth Kotecha- +2 Laps
- Rohit Goyal- DNF
Fastest Lap: Karminder Singh- 1:10.458
After round 1 the championship points tally for Avik Anwar is 60 and Affan’s 14. Round 2 for Volkswagen Ameo Cup is scheduled to be at the Madras Motor Racing Circuit, Chennai on 21-23rd July.
Founder of Auto Rebellion | Guest writer for zerotohundred.com