Rajiv snaps one point for IDEMITSU Honda Racing India with top 15 finish

IDEMITSU Honda Racing India's Rajiv Sethu once again snapped points for his team with a top 15 finish on Sunday's final race at the Asia Road Racing Championship (ARRC). Despite his back and hand injury from Saturday's crash, Rajiv earned one more point for India with his eighth top 15 finish this season.

Still learning the ropes of international racing in his debut ARRC season, 18-year-old Senthil Kumar continued his assault on time sheets to record his personal best lap record of 2:28:241 at Sepang. Despite his 8th row start from 22nd on the grid, Senthil quickly overtook Taipei's Liu Junmei and Thailand's Sawapol in lap 2 itself.

Maintaining 20th in lap 3, he jumped to 19th in lap 4 and maintained his stance for the 3 rounds, only to finish 17th in final 8th lap, with 5 positions gain overall. Today's Race 2 of Asia Production 250cc class saw Indonesians dominate the top 6 ranks.

In-fighting for the win went unabated till the chequered flag and took out two causalities - Rafid Topan and Muklada Sapapuech who crashed out in their attempt to lead in last lap. Ultimately, it was Astra Honda Racing team's Awhin Sanjaya who stopped the clock at 19:43:339. Hot on his heels was Andy Fadly trailing by only 0.048 seconds (19:43:387) and 3rd podium claimant Reynaldo Chrisantho (19:43:545).

IDEMITSU Honda Racing India is now stacked up in Top 9 teams of AP 250 class with 33 points. Rajiv is now placed 16th in the points tally with 33 points, while Senthil with no-gain-no-loss this weekend is tied at 26th out of 40 riders.

As the Sepang outing draws to a close, the battle for 2019 ARRC Championship will re-commence in Round 7 finale at Buriram, Thailand in December. Parallelly, Zaqhwan Zaidi of Honda Asia-Dream Racing with SHOWA team in ASB1000cc class finished 4th in today's race 2, putting him 3rd in the championship.

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