Manali’s Suresh Rana, Naik lift Raid title

MANALI: Suresh Rana and his codriver Ashwin Naik have won the 18th edition of the Maruti Suzuki Raid de Himalaya rally with overall lead time

Updated At : 06:48 AM Oct 16, 2016 IST

Suresh Rana (right) with his co-driver Ashwin Naik

MC Thakur

MANALI, OCTOBER 15

Suresh Rana and his co-driver Ashwin Naik have won the 18th edition of the Maruti Suzuki Raid de Himalaya rally with overall lead time. Suresh, a resident of Karjan village near Manali, has won this title for the record 10th time.

Suresh Rana was driving Maruti Suzuki Grand Vitara and clocked 03:42:02 hrs. Chasing the lead at the second position were Tsering Lhakpa and Venu Ramesh Kumar in Polaris RZR 1000, clocking 03:49:15 hrs and the third position was bagged by Sandeep Sharma and Karan Arya registering 03:51:11 hrs in Maruti Suzuki Gypsy.

The gruelling Xtreme route was approximately 800 km through some toughest terrains like Kaza (Spiti valley), Jispa and Sarchu. The treacherous terrains brought out the best synchronised relation between man and machine.

In the adventure category, Jagmeet Gill and Chandan Sen took the lead driving Maruti Suzuki Swift. This is the fourth consecutive win for Jagmeet and Chandan. Maruti Suzuki Swift is the first car to win the adventure category. Ajgar Ali and Mohd Mustafa in Maruti Suzuki Vitara Brezza and Sunder Singh and Zaman Daoud Khan in Vitara Brezza bagged second and third positions. The adventure category of the rally followed the scenic route of Manali, Solang valley, Tabo and through the sub-zero temperature of Sarchu.

Tanveer Abdul Wahid in his TVS RTR450 won the Motoquad Xtreme followed by R Natraj in TVS RTR450 and Umang Saxena was at the third position driving KTM Duke 390.

All Raid participants, the organisers and sponsors paid a tribute to the late Subhomoy Paul. He had participated thrice in Raid de Himalaya and several other international motorsports challenges.