Rotax karting champions crowned

TDT | Manama    

The Daily Tribune – www.newsofbahrain.com

Bahrain International Circuit (BIC), “The Home of Motorsport in the Middle East”, crowned over the weekend the 2023 champions of the Sakhir Rotax MAX Challenge (SRMC).

Julian Rivera, Nasser Nass, Luca Houghton, Oliver Kruglov, Kayne Thalathavil Cherian and Formula 1 legend Rubens Barrichello all captured the coveted titles of their respective competition categories.

They secured their crowns after the final two rounds of this year’s SRMC campaign, which took place on back-to-back days last Friday and Saturday at Bahrain International Karting Circuit (BIKC), the world-class grassroots motorsport facility of BIC in Sakhir.

Julian was the new champion of the Micro MAX class while Nasser won his title in the Mini MAX. Luca claimed his winner’s trophy in the Junior MAX category while Kruglov was tops amongst the Senior MAX runners.

Cherian triumphed in the DD2 MAX class and Barrichello rounded off the SRMC’s newest champions in the DD2 MAX Masters category.

With the SRMC now complete, the stage is set for the Bahrain Rotax MAX Challenge (BRMC) 2023/2024, which is set to feature eight rounds taking place until March of next year.

Like the SRMC, the BRMC is for individual racers competing against one another in sprint races in their very own Rotax-powered karts.

Participants interested in competing in this championship are invited to contact BIKC at the soonest on +973-1745-1745.

Round one of the BRMC is scheduled to take place on 15 December.

In the SRMC’s Micro MAX title fight, Julian Rivera was able to come away with the crown after finishing the four-round campaign with 124 points.

He was followed by Rayyan Najjar with 107 points and Patrikas Jocius on 64 points.

Julian won the fourth and final round and took second place in the penultimate meeting over the weekend to secure enough points for first overall on the championship standings.

Rayyan was third in both meetings, while Patrikas was the victor in round three before finishing behind Julian in the finale.

In the Mini MAX class, Nasser Nass took his title with 100 points on the table, beating out Shaikh Ahmed bin Saqer Al Khalifa by just five points.

Shaheen Shaheen finished in third place with 73 points.

Masus Mazinas and Majus Mazinas were the victors from the SRMC’s last two rounds this past weekend. Masus took the chequered flag in round three ahead of Nasser and Shaikh Ahmed.

Majus was then triumphant in round four, with Shaikh Ahmed as the runner-up and Adrians Tions completing the podium-placers in third.

In the Junior MAX category, Luca Houghton captured the title with 129 points.

Tye Mejia was second on 103, while Vedant Menon came third on 73 markers.

Luca completed a sensational campaign in which he stepped onto the podium in the Pre-Finals and Finals of all four rounds, while claiming the victories in rounds two through four.

His double triumph in the concluding two meetings earned him his comfortable cushion atop the final rankings.

Joining Luca on the podium in round three were Wian Boshoff and Gracie Grantham, while in round four Vedant was the runner-up and Eason Tseng came third.

Oliver Kruglov came away with the title in the Senior MAX class by the narrowest of margins.

He finished on 90 points— just a single point ahead of Mohammed Alhasan in their championship fight. Fahad Almuqla came third with 77 points.

Kruglov was classified as the runner-up in the SRMC finale, which was enough for him to bag the crown at the chequered flag.

He finished behind Alhasan, who made a clean sweep of the weekend’s events, winning the Pre-Finals and Finals of both rounds.

Najashi Rashdan and Almuqla were second and third in round three, while Francisco Daniel Altamirano joined Alhasan and Kruglov on the podium in round four.

In the MAX DD2 class, Kayne Thalathayil Cherian finished with 70 points on the standings, tied with Xen de Ruwe.

Henrijs Grube was third on 58 points.

Cherian claimed the title after winning the last two rounds this weekend. Grube was second and Mykolas Mazinas third in both of the weekend’s meetings.

In the MAX DD2 Masters, Rubens Barichello finished on 70 points as his double from rounds one and two were enough to secure the title.

Anthony Hogg finished as the runner-up on 49 points.

At the end of both meetings, the podium ceremonies took place along with the awarding of the 2023 SRMC champions. Officials from BIC, BIKC and the Bahrain Motor Federation attended the prize-giving and presented the winners their respective trophies.