Hailing from an underprivileged background, Jagat Singh and Nagarjuna A have created history with their hardwork and skills. These guys have lifted the winner’s trophy in the Super Class category at the T1 Prima Truck Race organized for Indian truck drivers. Tata Motors took a bold step to attract enthusiasts to the profession of truck driving by conducting the first of its kind Indian truck driver race.
For the race, the automaker giant initiated a new selection and training program. The program invited applications from truck drivers who are employed with Tata Motors’ key customers across the country for training and assessment over a period of three months. Dubbed as the T1 Racer Program, the initiative was brought into action with the help of Accenture and Motorsport Management (MOMA). Tata Motors went out to source the most experienced Prima truck and tractor Trailor drivers from its vast customer base and garnered about 550 nominations from all over India in a span of just two weeks. Next, the count was narrowed down to 147 by sieving the entries through a Racer Shortlisting Criteria that included the consideration of factors like – age limit, driving experience, annual kilometer covered and a few more.
Moving forward with an army of 147 shortlist drivers the company designed a training structure and executed it by employing some of the best race instructors to train and guide them. The driver underwent rigorous physical and mental training sessions that enabled them to transform themselves from road-drivers to Prima-racers. Further, all the drivers were tested through various levels of the training program. The Indian drivers were given smaller mid-size tempos initially and then regular trucks to take on race tracks of the Tata Motors facility. Finally, the three months program gave Tata motors 12 trained race-ready truck drivers that competed against each other in the T1 Prima Truck Racing Championship 2016 held at Buddh International Circuit.
Well, it was not just the drivers who got all the training and teachings, the T1 Prima trucks too underwent a series of changes for the competition. On the whole, a total of 43 new parts were introduced in the 2016 T1 Prima truck, for it to go faster with improved stability. The folks at Tata plonked in a new suspension system, new shock absorbers, new aluminum fuel tank and new tyres. The pumped Prima can fire out 370 Bhp of power at 2,100 rpm and a top speed of 130kmph. The 12 Indian drivers had these identical black Prima race trucks for themselves, which they used to whiz through the race track.
The T1 Prima race attracted of over 50,000 people, with the ‘Heroes of the Highways’ taking home the whopping price money of INR 10 Lakhs being awarded to each of the first place winners, of the two Super Class category races. Along with the Super Class action, the Pro Class races comprising of International drivers too kept the adrenaline rushing. In this class, David Jenkins from Team Tata Technologies took top honors while Rick Collett and Graham Powell from Team Tata Cummins finished second and third respectively in the 20-lap race.
Mat Summerfield of Team Castrol Vecton, winner of the first 8-lap race, clocked the fastest lap of 1:50:691 seconds, in the second race, around the 3.1 kilometers race track. In the first 8-lap race of the Indian drivers, Rajkumar Mahato clocked the fastest lap with 1:53:913 seconds, and in the second 8-lap race the winner himself, Nagarjuna A 1:52:952 seconds. Alongside the racing action, the event hosted musical performances of Indian artists – Badshah, Neeti Mohan, Garima Yajnik and Sunidhi Chauhan.
Here is a gallery of images from the action packed event, also check out the race results with lap timings!
