Rajiv Sethu pips Jagan for title in bike race

In a virtual repeat of Saturday’s Race-1, Sethu scored another win over National champion Jagan Kumar (TVS Racing) who, after leading for much of the eight-lap race, yielded ground and finished second ahead of Sarath Kumar (Idemitsu Honda Ten10 Racing). 

The double win took Sethu to the top of the championship standings with 70 points, well clear of defending champion Jagan (62). Also scoring wins were Kozhikode’s Amarnath Menon who led a 1-2 finish for Gusto Racing in the Pro-Stock 301-400cc class, Naresh Babu of RACR (ProStock 165cc) and Karthik Mateti who headed a Sparks Racing podium sweep in the Novice category while also setting a lap record in this class. 

Sethu and Jagan were again locked in a tight fight from the start. Pole-sitter Jagan, though managed to stay ahead of Sethu, could not pull away. In the penultimate of the eight-lap race, Sethu finally moved past Jagan to emerge comfortable winner. 

Amarnath Menon was involved in a three-way battle that included Saturday’s Race-1 winner and team-mate Sathyanarayana Raju and Prabhu Arunagiri (Team Alisha Abdullah). As the race progressed, Menon and Raju swapped lead positions lap by lap while opening up a gap on Arunagiri. 

Eventually, Menon got his nose in front and hung on to win his second race of the season with Raju in second spot followed by Arunagiri. Menon now heads the championship in this class with 72 points, 11 clear of Raju. 

Earlier, Sparks Racing team swept all three podium spots in the Novice (Stock, 165cc) category race with Mateti, a 19-year old Commerce student from Hyderabad, Aditya Rao (Bengaluru) and Alexander AS (Chennai) taking the chequered flag in that order after a close fight. 

After two rounds, Mateti and Rao are tied with 43 points apiece, having one race apiece. It was a fine win for rookie Mateti who is in his first full season of racing. He had participated in a few rounds of a one-make series last year before running out of funds. 

“I did not have much clue about racing bikes last year until I joined Sparks Racing. Today, it was a tough race and happy to win,” said Mateti.