Thaindian News

Coimbatore, July 15 (IANS) Barring reliability issues, the early championship leaders, Deepak Ravi Kumar (LGB Swift), veteran Radha Selvarajan (Super Saloon) and Bala Vijay (Indian Junior Touring Car) are set to retain their top spots as the second round of the two-day JK Tyre-FMSCI National Racing Championship begins at the Kari Motor Speedway here Saturday.

The trio won both the races in the first round at the same venue here last month in a convincing fashion, leaving the rest to scramble for minor positions. There was authority and assurance in their performances.

However, of the three, Radha Selvarajan (RAD Racing) would need to keep an eye on his rearview mirror with some hungry youngsters in hot pursuit.

Last year’s championship winner Siddharth Kishore (Performance Racing) is determined to make up for the dismal outing last month when he went off-track and then struggled with an ill-handling car that saw him finish eighth and fourth.

Likewise, local challenger Vijayakumar Rajvirudhan will be looking to get past Selvarajan after twice finishing behind the former champion in the opening round. It took all of Selvarajan’s considerable experience to keep his nose in front in both the races.

In the IJTC series, Bala Vijay (Moto-Rev India) just about managed to keep Diljith Shaji (LCT Sigaram Sports) at bay over the first round weekend and he will again be hard pressed to maintain his position at the top of the leaderboard.

The scenario in the Formula LGB Swift class is no different with Deepak (Mars Racing) and Karthik Krishna (TVS Girling) occupying the top two steps of the podium in the two races last month, but both need to be wary of other challengers who are not far behind.

In the Polo Cup series, Chennai’s Vishnu Prasad is in the clear following his double in the first round while there is hectic squabble for other two podium spots.

For all that, a lot would depend on the weather conditions. In the first round, the opening race of the Super Saloon class was run in the wet that made the going rather tricky if not treacherous while rest of the programme was gone through in fair weather.