Honda racer Rajiv dominates Day 1 of National Motorcycle meet

Honda rider Rajiv Sethu continued to lead in the Super Sports 165cc category, finishing second behind TVS racer Jagan Kumar on day one at Round 4 of the MRF MMSC FMSCI National Motorcycle Racing Championship at the Madras Motor Race Track here on Saturday.

The Honda Ten10 Racing rider secured the second place by clocking 10:18:134 minutes in the Super sport 165cc National Championship, a difference of just .03 seconds with Jagan.

Jagan exchanged leads over nine laps with Rajiv before the TVS racer pulled away, taking advantage of back-markers.

Going into Sunday's race of the double-header, Jagan, by virtue of this win, his third of the season, moved up to third place, just four points behind Mathana Kumar of Honda Ten10 Racing (101 points), who after a collision with TVS Racing's KY Ahamed in the first lap, limped home fifth. 

Rajiv continues to head the table with 123 points.

Meanwhile, in a dramatic turn of events including disqualification of two riders, Bengaluru's Aishwarya Pissay (Apex Racing Academy) clinched the title in the Girls category with a round to spare.

The 21-year-old Aishwarya had finished second behind Chennai's Alisha Abdullah in the eight-lap race with Kalyani Potekar from Indore coming third. 

The revised result of the race took Aishwarya's points tally to 83, which was 32 points clear of Kalyani in the championship standings with just one more race to be run October 29-November 1 and a maximum of 25 points available. 

"I am absolutely thrilled to win the championship with a round to spare. This is my second championship of the season," a delighted Aishwarya said. 

In the Super Sport Indian (300-400cc) category, Deepak Ravikumar survived a tight three-way fight to the finish ahead of Antony Peter (Team Alisha Abdullah) and championship leader Amarnath Menon (Gusto Racing) who played it smart and went for points. 

Menon is still comfortably placed with 140 points to Ravikumar's 91 with three more races, including one on Sunday and the double-header of the final round later this month.

The Pro-Stock category, which was run on a combined grid with Super Sport Indian (165cc), produced some drama as the top two contenders in this category, Aravind Balakrishnan and Aravind Ganesh crashed and failed to pick up any points.

Team Alisha Abdullah's S. Sivanesan took the honours after original winner Soorya P.M. was disqualified for disobeying a "ride-through" penalty for jump start.

Prabhu V. (Sparks Racing) and Sahay S. (Rockers Racing) finished second and third, respectively in the category.