Rahil Noorani started off the 2013 season on a high note by setting the fastest lap of the day during the qualifying session of Round 1 today. Following him closely was South African driver Jeffrey Kruger in the second place with his fastest lap time of 1:14.489. Rookie driver Anshul Shah, with best timing of 1:14.999 took the third place while Prashant Singh Tharani, with best timing of 1:15.114 took fourth spot to fill up the second row of the grid.
The 4th season of Polo R Cup kicked off with 14 fresh faces from across the country and 7 previous seasons’ drivers battling out for their positions on the grid for the very first race of 2013 calendar. Prior to the qualifying session, all of the drivers got one dry and one wet practice session on Friday and one dry practice session on Saturday morning.
In the qualifying session, Rahil Noorani secured the pole position on his lap itself. Following him very closely was Jeffrey Kruger, just 0.154 seconds behind, who will start the race tomorrow alongside Rahil from the first row. Amongst the 14 rookie drivers, Anshul Shah showed a promising start to his career with a fastest lap time of 1:14.999, 0.664 seconds behind pole setter and took the third place in his very first qualifying.
Prithviraj Siddappa, Head of Motorsports, said, “2013 season has finally taken off and we are glad to have as many as 14 fresh drivers lining up for the race tomorrow. Rahil and Jeffrey put on a stunning show. However, it was interesting to see how rookie driver Anshul has managed to go faster than some of the experienced drivers.”
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The Polo R Cup 2013 will have five race weekends. The season has begun with the current round and will be on till December. Besides Coimbatore, races will take place at Madras Motorsport Race Track in Chennai, Buddh International Circuit in Greater Noida and a street circuit (TBD) as below:
Round Venue Dates
1 Kari Motor Speedway, Coimbatore 19 July – 21 July
2 Madras Motorsport Race Track, Chennai 9 August – 11 August
3 Street Race – TBD 6 September – 8 September
4 Buddh International Circuit, Greater Noida 27 September – 29 September
5 Buddh International Circuit, Greater Noida 29 November – 1 December
Thanks to its proven concept of promoting young talent abroad, the Polo Cup enjoys the reputation of being an ideal stepping stone to enter professional racing. Building on its success of two great seasons since its inception in 2010, Volkswagen Motorsport hopes to make the Polo R Cup this year an exciting and challenging season in the Indian Motorsports calendar.