Chennai, Dec 6 – K. Vinoth of Wallace Sports swept to three victories but eventually fell short by two points behind 15-year old team-mate Vikash Anand who won the championship title in the JK Tyre Junior Cup formula racing series that concluded here Sunday.
Vikash, the schoolboy from Chennai, won just once in the 10-race series that was held over two consecutive weekends, but finished consistently on the podium with four second places and as many third places for a tally of 73 points.
In contrast, Vinoth, a biker turned four-wheeler racer and participating in his third Junior Cup, ended up with six outright wins, including three Sunday, but yet finished second in the championship as he ended up with 71 points.
The two-point difference was due to Vikash’s fastest lap Sunday that fetched him a crucial point besides two podium finishes and it made up for a non-finish in the day’s second race when he got involved in a turn-2 pile-up as four cars were taken out by an oil spill.
While Vikash was indeed the toast of the crowd, it was Vinoth who won the hearts with a terrific comeback as he all but made up an 18-point deficit at the start of the final three races of the championship.
‘It was a very competitive championship and even more so today. Since I was well ahead on points, I decided to keep my position instead of attempting to win a race which is what I actually wanted to do. But I didn’t want to take any risks and throw away the chance of winning the championship,’ Vikash said.
By virtue of annexing the title, Vikash earned a fully-sponsored drive in the Formula LGB Swift class of the 2010 National Championship commencing in February.
The results (all eight laps):
Race 1 – K Vinoth (Wallace Sports) 1 (10mins, 13.572 secs); Vikash Anand (Wallace Sports) 2 (10:13.709); Karthik Krishna (Rams Racing) 3 (10:14.051).
Race 2 – K Vinoth 1 (10:31.041); Isaac Joseph (Rams Racing) 2 (10:36.002); Varun Natwani (Rams Racing) 3 (10:54.438).
Race 3 – K Vinoth 1 (10:20.006); Sandeep Kumar (Rams Racing) 2 (10:20.240); Vikash Anand 3 (10:20.495).
