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Nearly 100 riders taking part

By Sanjay Rajan

PANJIM OCT. 12. It has been raining here for the last three days and the wetness of the track at the Campal Parade ground could pose a few problems to the riders who have assembled here for the second of the five-round MRF National motocross championship scheduled for Sunday.

"The track is slow and full of tight corners. Whoever gets a good start should win," said Pacer Yamaha's Dyanesh Barguje of Pune, who finished third behind the Bangalore cousins, C. Vijayakumar and T.K. Vishwanath, of TVS Racing, in the Experts foreign bikes open class in the opening round last Sunday.

The circuit has 15 jumps (most of them double jumps), two table tops and a set of whoop-de-doos. It is slushy in some places and comfortably wet in a few other corners to provide good traction.

"It's a technical track," said Vishwanath. "It's certain to be interesting," chipped in Vijayakumar, the hot favourite who clocked the fastest times at practice on Saturday.

"It's the kind of circuit that you have to approach with a cool head, cause it is not about speed alone, it is about not making mistakes," said former champion Shyam Kothari, whose firm Sportstrek, is conducting the championship.

"You have to apply the golden principle of motocross here: slow in the corners and fast off them. You don't use the berms in the slushy corners, but make the most of them in corners where there is traction," he added.

Close to 100 riders from all over the country will be taking part in the six categories, for both experts and novices, and the battle between TVS Racing and Pacer Yamaha will continue. Pacer, which got swamped in the opening round, promises that things will be different here. Watch out for Delhi's Nipender Jassy and Barguje, they say, cause this is the kind of situation that Jassy revels in.

There is an event exclusively for locals, apart from a demonstration round.

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