Bandaragama (Sri Lanka), Sep 28 (IANS) Aarav Dewan, the 15-year-old from Gurugram, and Chikmagaluru’s Tarushi Vikram each secured a silver medal at the FIA Asia-Pacific Motorsport Championship 2025, which concluded here on Sunday.
Aarav finished second in the Senior class of the Karting Sprint event, while Tarushi, who had won a silver medal at the Asian Auto Gymkhana Championship yesterday, delivered another impressive performance to secure second place in the Asia-Pacific Motorsport Championship segment.
However, Aarav’s P2 finish was hardly a consolation for India, as Kiaan Shah (Juniors) and Rehan Khan Rasheed (Cadet) retired from their respective finals due to a mechanical issue and a crash, respectively, when they were in contention for a potential podium spot.
Eight-year-old Arshi Gupta from Faridabad showed great potential by finishing fourth, just five-hundredths of a second behind third-placed Sum Lo from Hong Kong, China, while Bengaluru’s Rayan Gowda was ninth in the Cadet Final.
In the senior final, Aarav drove well but could not match the pace of the leader Yu Ka Po (Hong Kong, China), and focused on defending his P2 position, which, however, was hardly challenged, while B Kumar Gowda (Bengaluru) was seventh.
“It was a good race, but I just didn’t have the pace to match the leader. So, I did the next best thing of defending my P2 position. I am thrilled to win a medal for India and it’s my first in an international championship,” said Aarav.
In the Junior section, Kiaan Shah’s retirement was a big disappointment when he was running second as the engine expired midway through the race. The other two Indians in the fray, Akshat Misra (Bengaluru), came in a creditable fifth, and Thomas Jacob George (Kottayam), eighth. Similarly, Rehan Khan Rasheed, who led in the first two laps, faltered and dropped to fifth, but was on a charge when an understeer led to a crash.
The two Indian teams finished fifth and eighth in the final standings, after briefly showing a glimmer of hope of competing for a possible podium spot in the two-hour Endurance race. In the two Endurance Sprints (30 minutes), the two Indian teams made little progress and finished in midfield positions.
India left without a medal in Karting Slalom, although some competitors came close to securing a podium position.
India’s hopes of a medal in the Autocross event ended with Chetan Shivram (Bengaluru) and Philippos Matthai (New Delhi) finishing outside the top 8 that progressed to the medal round. Yesterday, the other Indian entry, Pragathi Gowda, was eliminated.
Even as Tarushi won her second silver this weekend, the gold medallist in the AAGC event yesterday, Achintya Mehrotra (New Delhi), could not reproduce his form as he picked up too many penalties for knocking down the cones and dropped out of medal contention. Prateek Dalal (Bahadurgarh, Haryana), the other Indian entrant, met a similar fate.
India’s challenge ended when Pune’s Sai Shiva Makesh Shankaran (Pune), the only Indian in the iRacing event, crashed in the semi-final round.
–IANS
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