National TSD Rally: 20 teams all set to descend on the tarmac-dirt route

IANS

Bangalore, Aug 15 (IANS): Some 20 entries have been received for the third round of the FMSCI Indian National TSD Rally Championship to be run here Sunday after a ceremonial flag-off Saturday evening.

The husband-wife pair of Satish Gopalkrishnan and navigator Savera D'Souza are comfortably placed at the top of the championship leaderboard (both Overall and Pro-Expert class) having won the previous two rounds of the competition, and they would be looking to consolidate their early gains.

Behind the leaders, three pairs are within a point of each other. Ajgar Ali and Mohammed Musthafa (28), Srikanth Gowda and Chandrasekhar M. (28) and Karthick Maruthi and Sankar Anand (27) are locked in a close battle.

In the Pro-Stock class, the top five pairs separated by just eight points. Ravindra Kumar and B.V. Kumar M are in the lead with 33 points, followed by Tata Motors' team of Chidananda Murthy and Sujith Kumar (31), Sourav Chatterjee and Ashoke Kumar Basu (28), Philip Baklin and David Sharon (27), and Amarnath G.J and Mukhtiyar Ahmed (25).

The competitors will cover 195 km on Sunday and the route will be a mix of tarmac and dirt, according to clerk-of-the-course J. Balakrishna who briefed the media here Friday.