KARAMJIT CRUISES TO EASY VICTORY

3rd August, 2008, Bandar Penawar, Johor: Malaysian Rally Champion Karamjit Singh cruised to an easy victory in the fourth round of the 2008 Malaysian Rally Championship in Desaru, Johor today after building up a comfortable lead of almost five minutes in the first six SS yesterday.

The advantage was put to good use, allowing the GSR Pennzoil Team number one driver to drive cautiously to preserve his car on the rough and unforgiving SS in Felda Kledang and Adela which claimed four cars on the first day.

Despite complaining about the tricky conditions, Karamjit, in the Mitsubishi Lancer Evolution, extended his lead over Kan Chee Hong, driving a Perodua Myvi 4WD turbo by more than 19 minutes.

Karamjit completed 141.72 kilometres in the 12 SS with a time of 1:36:58, averaging 88.04 kilometres per hour. Kan clocked 1:56:04.

The Perodua M5 driver had started the second day in third place behind Karamjit’s teammate Gunaseelan Rajoo but quickly found the pace to outdrive him by SS 9, the third SS of the day.

Gunaseelan completed the rally with a time of 1:57:53.

Kan’s co-driver, Wayne Cheah said that they had a good Sunday as the car had the pace to allow them to push hard.

“After the problem with the transfer box seizing due to overheating yesterday, today we managed to clock good times to improve our position and we are happy to be on the podium,” Cheah said.

Perodua M5 team manager, Garry Chua was also pleased with the Myvi’s result although he is more circumspect about the accident that ruined team mate, Lim Leong Onn’s prospect of challenging Karamjit for the outright win.

“We came here aiming for two podium positions and we did not achieve it. But one in the top three is better than nothing,” Chua said.

Gunaseelan who is also the manager of the GSR Pennzoil Team was pleased with Karamjit’s and his own pace throughout the weekend.

“What is important is that we work towards winning the Team championship and right now Karamjit is leading the rally and obviously his class (P12) while I am leading my class (A8) and finished third overall which will contribute valuable points to the team results,” Guna said.

“We had a tough battle with Kan Chee Hong yesterday and I decided early on that it is more important to finish the race and collect points than to push too hard and risk damaging the car. Anyway, I am still getting used to this car and on the first day we suffered some damage after the car landed hard after a bump. We had to replace the right rear suspension but today, thankfully we drove without incident,” he added.

Fourth was Arjun Rao and navigator Jagdev Singh, who brought their Proton Putra 4WD home with a time of 2:04:21. Rao was followed by veteran driver ‘Mike’ Ari who is staging a strong comeback after years away from the rallying scene. Ari’s total time was 2:06:17.

Clubman driver Abdul Ghafar Alias and his navigator Mohd Rafidi Wahiddudin continued with their impressive form from Round 3 again finishing sixth overall ahead of the more experienced P Nandakumar and Mohd Rafiq Udhaya.

The early leaders of the clubman championship, Roduwan Rashid and navigator Musa Sabarudin had to be happy with ninth position and were followed by another clubman entrant Azizul Jamin and co-driver Rohasreen Abu Bakar.

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