Jaipur, March 1, 2014: The 12th Maruti Suzuki Desert
Storm, the annual six-day marathon motorsport event, finished at Jaipur today
after traversing approximately 2,200 kilometers over the Thar Desert and the
entire span of the dune country.
Mr Manohar Bhat, Vice President Maruti Suzuki said it was
remarkable that in a marathon motorsport event open to participation of
vehicles of all makes, seven out of the total 9 prizes went to
Maruti-manufactured vehicles.
The top prize in the Rally Ndure category went to Satish
Gopalkrishnan and navigator Savera D’Souza, driving a Grand Vitara for Team
Maruti Suzuki. Satish, the software guru from Bangalore , is the man who developed the TSD
meter to change the face of time-speed-distance rallying in the country.
Second in Rally Ndure is the team of Pratap Thakur and
navigator Dhiraj Arora, driving a Maruti Gypsy, again for Team Maruti Suzuki.
Third in Rally Ndure is Ashish Budhia and navigator Arindam Ghosh.
In Rally Xtreme, the first prize went to Sunny Sidhu of
Chandigarh with navigator PVS Murthy. The second prize was won by Sandeep
Sharma of Delhi and Varun Davessar of Chandigarh , driving a
Maruti Gypsy. The third prize in Rally Xtreme went to Amartej Pal Buwal of
Delhi and navigator Nakul Mendiratta, driving a Maruti Gypsy.
In Rally Xplore, Rajesh Chalana and navigator Yogesh Gupta
ranked first, driving an SX4 for Team Maruti Suzuki. Second in the category was
Nitin Yadav with navigator Ravi Bansal, driving a Mahindra Scorpio. The third
prize in the category went to Sanjay Takale with navigator Mustafa, driving SX4
for Team Maruti Suzuki.
In Rally Moto (Motorcycles), CS Santosh of Bangalore
retained his title as India ’s
top biker by ranking first, driving a Suzuki RMX 450. The second prize in this
category went to Helmut Frauwallner of Austria , driving a Yamaha WR450F.
Third in Rally Moto was Suresh Babu, driving a Suzuki RMS 450Z.
The rally was flagged off from Delhi on February 26. It moved though the
wild outback region of Sardarshahar, Bikaner ,
Chattargarh, Jaisalmer, Sam, Pokhran, Lakshmangarh and other areas to finally
end at Jaipur.
Mr Manohar Bhat, Vice President of Maruti Suzuki, said it
was a matter of pride that the number of competitors was growing each year at
the Maruti Suzuki Desert Storm. The 12th Maruti Suzuki Desert Storm ran
with the highest number of rallyists in its 12-year-history. A total of 250
champion rallyists from various parts of the country and abroad competed in
various categories.
There were 55 teams in Rally Xtreme and 35 teams in Rally
Moto (both categories based solely on fastest timing). In addition, there were
35 teams in Rally Ndure and 25 teams in Rally Xplore (both based on the time-speed-distance
format).
Photo caption: Satish Gopalkrishnan and Savera D'Souza, winners of Rally
Ndure, driving a Grand Vitara for Team Maruti Suzuki
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