Venkatesh Shetty Wins JK Tyre Monsoon Scooter Rally 2018

The 29th edition of the JK Tyre Monsoon Scooter Rally saw riders brave the wet and slushy conditions last weekend, as Mumbai rider Venkatesh Shetty was crowned the winner for the second year in a row. The JK Tyre Monsoon Scooter Rally 2018 saw a last-minute shift in its location from Navi Mumbai to the village of Sarul, on the outskirts of Nasik, and yet the participation remained at its best. Shetty completed the 5 km circuit, as opposed to the previous 35 km in Navi Mumbai, in a total time of 19m03s over the three-stage course, astride his rally-prepped Aprilia SR 150 Race. Venkatesh Shetty also posted the fastest lap of the day with a time of 5m57s in his second run.

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A total of 34 riders participated in the rally from different parts of the country including Mumbai, Pune, Bhopal, Vadodara, Raigad, Panvel and Nashik. This year saw two women riders too participating in the slush filled fest. The JK Tyre Monsoon Scooter Rally 2018 also saw two factory teams participating - Aprilia and TVS - keeping the fun quotient in scooter rallying alive. Individual entries saw a host of scooter participating including the LML Vespa, Honda Activa, TVS Wego and more.

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The Sarul village provided a scenic and rain-drenched weekend for the Monsoon Rally, challenging the skill and grit of the riders. While reigning champion Shetty took a dominant win this year too, coming in second was Zeeshan Sayed from Mumbai, also running the Aprilia SR 150 Race, finishing the three-stage stretch in 21m36s. Finishing third was TVS Racing's Syed Asif Ali who was running the TVS NTorq SXR scooter, who completed the rally in 22m91s. One of the favourites, Pinkes Thakkar of Aprilia had to retire early on despite being in P2, due to an eye injury caused by flying debris.

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Speaking about yet another exciting edition of the JK Tyre Monsoon Scooter Rally 2018, organiser, Shrikant Karani said, "I am very happy that we managed to pull off the rally. We barely had 10 days to put everything in place after our original venue had to be abandoned due to reasons beyond our control. The competitors showed faith in our event and came over to Nashik and rode brilliantly to the delight of the local fans. The local association and the entire city gave us a lot of support."

RESULTS

Overall Winners:

1. Venkatesh Shetty

2. Zeeshan Sayed

3. Syed Asif Ali

Above 80 cc Upto 110 cc:

S1 - 2 Stroke (Group B): 1. Rohan Thakur; 2. Nilesh Thakare; 3. Mohasin Shaikh

Scooter Above 110cc Upto160 cc

S2 - Geared Scooter (Group B): 1. Manjit Singh Bassan; 2. Chinmay Bisht; 3. Vicky Jaskaransingh

Scooter 80cc To 210 cc (S-1 to S-3) - 4 Stroke (Group B): 1.Venkatesh Shetty; 2. Zeeshan Sayed; 3. Syed Asif Ali

Ladies Class -Open (Group B): 1. Amruta Guruji; 2. Priyanka Singh

Best performance by a first timer In two-wheeler rally: 1. Niraj Wanjale; 2. Saddam Hussain Vanniyar; 3. Sachin Khengle