Consequently, second spot went to Hyderabad pair of Naveen Puligilla and co-driver Santosh Thomas with Coimbatore’s Ramcharan C (co-driver Jeevarathinam, Bengaluru) of Arka Motorsports completing the podium. Only three of the nine starters in the Asia Cup completed the event.

Former World Rally champion (Production Cars), Karamjit Singh from Malaysia who is training Pragathi, was a shattered man. “We lost P2 in the Asia Cup. We are still figuring out how they ran out of fuel, but on the positive side, I am happy at the progress Pragathi made in the past one week. She was stepping up the pace Stage by Stage and getting comfortable with the car. She has a lot of talent and potential,” said Karamjit.

A dejected Thakur rued that he slipped to second after looking primed to win. “We had an exhaust issue. So, after SS-11, we stopped on the transport section to carry out some running repairs. It cost us time and we had to take a 30-second penalty for check-in at the next Time Control. We are extremely disappointed but hope to do better in the next round,” said Thakur.

Kerala’s Vishak Balachandran (co-driver Anil Abbas), supported by MRF Tyres, took the honours in the INRC 3 while Shillong’s Phoebe Nongrum (co-driver Nash Ross, Hyderabad) of SNAP Racing, topped the Women INRC category with two front runners, Anushriya Gulati and Tarushi Vikram retired with mechanical problems. MRF Tyres-backed Arjun Rajiv from Bengaluru (co-driver Vinay Padmashali, Mysuru) of Chettinad Sporting drove well to clinch the title in the Junior INRC category.