2018 VW Ameo Cup: Saurav Bandyopadhyay Wins Race 1 Of Round 2 At MMRT

The second round of the 2018 Ameo Cup got off to a flying start on Saturday (July 21) with title-favourite Dhruv Mohite, the winner of Race 1 and Race 2 at the Kari Motor Speedway, starting from pole position at the first race at Madras Motor Sports Club in Sriperumbudur, Chennai, followed by Saurav Bandyopadhyay, Anmol Singh and Shubhomoy Ball. Before the race, Dhruv was confident that he could extend his lead in the championship by the end of the weekend, which would also mark the halfway point of this year’s championship.

“It’s not going to be easy here, you have people charging from behind. The grid has a lot of experienced drivers and many new drivers with a lot of talent. So I’m going to hold my horses and try to play it as safe as possible,” said Dhruv after lining up his Ameo race car powered by the 1.8-litre TSI engine from the Polo GTi for the formation lap.

The racer, who has more than 12 years of experience in karting, was raring to get off the line and go for the win. However, Race 1proved unfortunate for the driver from Kolhapur as Saurav pulled ahead of him before Turn 1 and held the inside line to take the lead. Behind them, Shubhomoy got the better of Anmol, who dropped to fifth by Turn 2. Meanwhile, Car No.15 driven by Renuka Gajendran from Bangalore drove off the track and broke its front left suspension, leaving behind a cloud of dust. By the end of Lap 1, Anmol was able to claw his way back to fourth by overtaking Jeet Jhabak from Hyderabad before the bridge section of the track.

By the start of the second lap, the first six cars were within one second of each other! The roar of the engines along with the smell of unleaded fuel made it a tense affair for everyone at the paddock. Meanwhile, at the back straight Saurav took a very defensive line, letting Dhruv make a move from the outside. However, he ran out of space and had to go wide to let Saurav through without any incidents. Meanwhile, Anmol and Jeet, both former Junior Cup winners, had an interesting battle going for the third position. The two drivers were right beside each other and at one point, it looked like the latter forced the man from Ghaziabad into the grass.  However, Anmol remained calm and reclaimed third position while Jeet fell back the order after making a mistake. All eyes were on the top two now.

With Dhruv piling the pressure on Saurav, with his lights flashing, the latter had to take a more defensive approach. But that didn’t mean he was taking it slow either. He set the fastest lap so far with a time of 1.56.390. The next lap saw Anmol break that with a time of 1.55.900, closing in on the two cars at the front. This forced Dhruv to take the outside line just before the bridge complex to try and snatch the lead from Saurav. Unfortunately, his brakes locked up and ran wide, allowing Anmol to close the gap even further. If not for his vast experience in the Ameo Cup, he could have easily traded paint with the armco. The main straight saw Dhruv take a defensive line and touch Anmol before entering Turn 1, making the crowd roar for more. However, the latter had the inside line and overtook Dhruv before Turn 2. He wasn’t able to make the move stick though as Dhruv found the inside line into the chicane and passed Anmol into Turn 4. This let Saurav pull out a huge gap at the front.

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Behind him, the action was getting hotter, with Anmol right behind Dhruv’s bumper as they entered the long back straight. With two laps to go, the fight for second and third was getting intense, with both cars making contact and nudging each other, letting Shubomoy catch up right behind. Whoever said motorsport was not a proper sport was so wrong. The Bangalore-based driver stayed right behind the two in front, waiting for them to make a mistake so that he could leap ahead and hunt down Saurav. However, Dhruv and Anmol had other ideas and kept battling for the second spot. At the end of the back straight, Anmol was ahead of Dhruv for a couple of seconds, forcing Dhruv to brake late into the next corner. But Anmol held a wider line, which let him run faster, albeit a bit wide into the bridge section. However, a tiny error from Anmol let Dhruv get beside him into the last corner, while Saurav had already crossed the chequered flag. As the two cleared the corner, Anmol was just about able to get his nose ahead of Dhruv’s car and crossed the line to claim second, making for quite a spectacle. What was even more impressive was the fact that both drivers gave each other enough space while managing to trade places three times in the space of three corners!

Saurav was clearly ecstatic about his win. “Yesterday, while qualifying, I ruined one of my tyres. So I had to swap that for an older tyre. Going into Race 1 at MMSC, I knew I had to preserve the newer tyres for the later races. So I knew my pace wasn’t going to be incredible, I just had to get the move done and then defend. Hopefully, tomorrow’s race should be better with the fresh tyres,” he said after collecting the winner’s trophy.

When asked about his reaction on getting his first ever podium finish, Anmol said, “I can’t believe it myself. I think Dhruv had an issue with his car because he slowed down quite a bit. That’s why I was able to catch up and attack him.”

“I was quite nervous because it was the first time I qualified on the second row. Dhruv was definitely trying his best to maintain his position. But I think I had a little bit more grip through the corners. So I went for it from the outside on the last corner and managed to get ahead of him. It feels great, it feels amazing. Happy high,” he added.

Dhruv, who had every reason to be disappointed, was surprisingly optimistic about the rest of the weekend. “There were a couple of things I got wrong in the first race. But I had a good start. However, a couple of things were done at the wrong time... and that’s on me, and I feel I need to play my strategy better. But I look forward to getting it right the next time.”

After the race, Sirish Vissa, head of Volkswagen Motorsport India, said, “I think all three of them drove very well. They had a nice battle going amongst them and they kept it clean, which is what we want to see. But we did have a few incidents up and down through the field. But overall, I think considering how warm it is and how difficult the conditions are, everyone drove really well and the cars performed flawlessly. So I’m quite happy with the outcome.”

Other notable drives worth mentioning included the one from Shivani Pruthvi from Davangere, who had a clean race to finish fifth after starting from eighth on the grid.