Chennai, July 10 : While Rajini Krishnan and Sarvesh Balappa notched up their fourth straight win, KY Ahamed won an absolute thriller that lit up the
second round of the MRF MMSC FMSCI Indian National Motorcycle Racing Championship 2022 which concluded at the Madras International Circuit,
about 40 km here on Sunday.

Starting P9 for the eight-lap race in the popular Pro-Stock 165cc Open race, Ahamed (Petronas TVS Racing), who endured two crashes on Saturday,
showed poise and required aggression to snatch a dramatic win from Pacer Yamaha’s Mathana Kumar and Rajiv Sethu (Idemitsu Honda SK69 Racing)
with just one-tenth of a second separating the trio at the finish.

The eventual outcome was in suspense as the three front-running riders exchanged lead after two other contenders, Deepak Ravikumar (Petronas
TVS Racing) and Prabhu Arunagiri (Pacer Yamaha), retired in the second half of the race. Ahamed then pulled out a last-gasp win in a photo-finish
that would be remembered for long.

Meanwhile, in the premier Pro-Stock 301-400cc Open category, Rajini Krishnan (RACR Castrol Power1), riding Yamaha R3 with a lighter frame than last year’s,
was simply unstoppable on his way to a fluent win that underlined his class and calibre, as he destroyed the field. His victory margin was over 10 seconds
in the eight-lap race with the Petronas TVS Racing duo of KY Ahamed and Deepak Ravikumar coming in second and third, respectively.

It was Rajini’s fourth win on the trot this season, following his double in the first round at Coimbatore last month.

Ryhana Bee, after a disappointing first round in Coimbatore last month, bounced back to win the National Championship Girls race (Stock 165cc) to put her campaign on track. She took the top honours ahead of Bengaluru’s Aditi Krishnan (Winverve Apex Racing Academy) who moved up a spot after 2nd placed Lani Zena Fernandez (Speed Up Racing) was docked a 15-second penalty which dropped her to fourth behind Axor Sparks Racing’s Jagruti Penkar from Mumbai. Lani was penalised for “causing avoidable collision” that involved early race leader Ann Jennifer (Alpha Racing) who finished fifth.

Hubballi’s Sarvesh Balappa (Axor Sparks Racing) continued his dream run as he finished the weekend with a double on the back of his two wins in the first round
to remain unbeaten in the Novice (Stock 165cc) category. Finishing second was Md Samrul Zubair (Hyderabad) of Raceists Motorcycle Racing Club who started
the race from P33 and worked his way up. His team-mate P Vignesh Goud, also from Hyderabad, was third.

Also scoring four consecutive wins were Sarthak Shrikant Chavan (Pune) and Raheesh Mudassar Khatri (Mumbai) in the NSF 250R and Novice (CBR 150)
categories of the Idemitsu Honda India Talent Cup, besides Bengaluru school boy Chiranth Vishwanath in the Rookie class of the Petronas TVS One-Make
Championship.(UNI)