Motorsports - Mrf Challenge, Fia Gt Series & National Karting

MRF Challenge
The 2013 MRF Challenge will hold its inaugural round as the support race for this year’s Formula 1 Indian Grand Prix. The series, which features Dallara designed Formula 2000 cars assembled and maintained at Jayem Automotives in Coimbatore was originally scheduled for mid-September with rounds planned for overseas circuits in West Asia and South East Asia too. However issues with shipping the cars to the venues means that no round will be held before the Indian GP weekend. The, as yet, unannounced calendar is likely to be revealed in late September with the driver line up confirmed by mid-October.

FIA GT Series
The Indian participants in the FIA GT Series - Armaan Ebrahim and Karun Chandhok - endured a difficulat weekend at the Autodrom Slovakia Ring for the fourth round of the six round sportscar racing series. Exhaust problems for Chandhok’s Seyfarth Motorsport Mercedes-Benz SLS AMG GT3 and a blown engine for Ebrahim’s BMW Sports Trophy Team India BMW Z4 GT3 put both drivers in the non-finishers section of the qualifying race classification. Chandhok was able to make the start for the main race and finished tenth along with teammate Jan Seyfarth. However Ebrahim along with Slovak teammate Filip Sladecka had to sit out the main race after the team were unable to repair the Z4 GT3’s engine during the three hour gap between the two races. The series will move on to the Navarra circuit in Spain before the final round, which is shceduled to be held at a street circuit in the Azerbaijani capital of Baku.

National Karting

Nayan Chatterjee (pictured, in middle) beat Dhruv Mohite (right) and 2011 Senior national karting champion Vishnu Prasad to win the Senior Max final of the third round of the JK Tyre National Rotax Max Karting Championship at the Kari Motor Speedway in Coimbatore. Chatterjee in the process also beat his Rayo Racing teammate and defending sernior karting champion Ameya Bafna to the top step of the podium. The Junior Max final was won by Khush Maini from Krishnaraaj D Mahadik and Arya Chirag Gandhi. Pradyumna V Danigond, Paul Francis and Yash Aradhya were the top three in the Micro Max final. The result took Chatterjee to the top of the points standings in the Sernior Max, one point ahead of Prasad and eleven ahead of Bafna. Mahadik leads the Junior Max standings by 11 points while Danigond is similarly eleven points of his closest competitor in the Micro Max category.