Series leaders Tejas Hirani, Anish
Chauhan, Baldev Chager and Amit Pandya
will be the star attractions during the
eighth round of the national auctocross
series slotted for this Sunday at Athi
River’s Portland Cement racetrack.
Chager, who recently won the Classic Car
Cup in Kilifi Rally in Onkar Rai’s Porsche
911, will return to circuit racing in a
blindngly fast and chopped up Subaru N10
which is an ex-Tundo rally car. After
winning the KNRC at penultimate stage in
October, Chager hopes to seal a rare
double in the open class and will be up
against his team-mate Onkar Rai. Among
those expected in the Athi River meeting
are Samir Khan, Shazz Esmail and Bobby
Sehmi who came in third overall in
Mombasa— followed by Amit Bhatt.
After seven rounds, Pandya consolidated
his lead in 2WD Turbo series to 122.
Sehmi and Bhatt now tie on 104 while
Samir Khan remains in fourth place with
70 points. Tejas requires a solitary point
to clinch his maiden autocross
championship in the 2WD non-Turbo
class, which he has led from the second
race to date.
Series leader Amit Pandya and his
namesake Amit Bhatt have fought a good
battle in the 2WD Turbo class but the
former has had an edge winning in the
recent MMC autocross staged in Miritini.
Tejas, a Year 8 student at St. Austin’s
Academy, has been practicing really hard
this season having been to the Formula
One BMW Academy in Germany for trials
which came to fruition. He was also
recently in South Africa where he caught
the eye of the trainers at the FIA
Institute’s 2013/14 Young Driver
Excellence Academy. He reached the
finals but failed to secure the single slot
allocated to the African continent.
All that Tejas needs to do to seal the 2013
deal and by extension chalk-up his
maiden autocross diadem. Sachin Choda,
who retired in the MMC round has an
outside chance as he must win the last
two events with bonus points and hope
that Tejas doesn’t score any points at all.
Choda is expected to share a Rage Buggy
with Gurmeet Mehta. Winning the Coast
tour improved Teja’s tally to 136 points.
Sachin remains a distant second on 93
points and would score a maximum of
137 points should he triumph in the last
two with bonus points.