While Sandeep Kumar, starting from P3, had to work hard for his success, holding off Bengaluru’s Anand Swaminathan and pole-sitter Arya Singh (Kolkata), the experienced Matharoo scored a lights-to-flag win from pole position. Another Bengalurean, Chetan Surineni topped in the MRF Formula 1600 category almost unchallenged.
Among the other big winners of the day was Mumbai’s Biren Pithawalla (Team N1 Racing) who took the honours in the Race-1 of the Indian Touring Cars category after pole-sitter and defending champion Arjun Balu (Race Concepts) retired when leading due to an electrical malfunction.
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Further, Pithawalla gained a spot after race winner Ritesh Rai slipped to second as he was docked a 15-second penalty following an incident involving Gurunath Meiyappan (Race Concepts) who came in third. Balu decided to pack up for the weekend, skipping the remaining two races.
Later, Meiyappan scored a facile win, his second of the season, in Race 2 ahead of Ritesh Rai and Biren Pithawalla to move to the top of the points table in the ITC category.
Akkineni Anand Prasad (Team Performance Racing) from Chennai and Thrissur’s Diljith TS (DTS Racing) notched a double apiece in the Indian Junior Touring Cars and Super Stock categories, respectively. While Prasad moved to the top of the championship table, Diljith remains unbeaten in all five starts over two rounds so far.