BELAGAVI: Motorsport has an abundance of men. So the sight of two women in the same car scorching the tracks at one of India’s top cross-country rallies is bound to turn heads.
And the fact that it’s the only all female driver-navigator duo in the Ultimate Cars category makes it more surreal. The Maruti Suzuki Dakshin Dare is on in full swing, having completed Day 3 on Wednesday. The team of Anu Rana and Minaxi Purohit are pushing their male counterparts to the limit at the five-day event which ends in Pune on Friday.
Off the slushy tracks, Rana is a media professional and Purohit a social worker. The former has been rallying for two years with her sister Poonam Rana as the navigator at majority of the events. In a chat with Express, Rana explained how the partnership at ‘Dare’ with Minaxi came about. “My sister was busy with other professional work. She is a manager at a multinational company and was not able to make it. And since I had navigated for Minaxi at a rally, I asked her and she agreed,” revealed Rana.
This is Rana’s third ‘Dare’ experience and she has managed to complete the rally on both the previous occasions. “I remember I had toppled during my first ‘Dare’ rally. But I was content that I had finished.”
Purohit, who hails from Gujarat, said that she is primarily a driver and the navigation sojourn has been a learning curve.
“I am much more comfortable behind the wheels and I still have to learn a lot when it comes to navigation. Today (Wednesday), I had a few problems while making the calls. Sometimes, I said ‘turn left’ instead of right,” Purohit said, adding that she is happy with the performance even though they dropped two places to be placed eleventh overall after the end of Leg 3 in Belagavi. “Two more days are left. We will do much better.”
The third day’s stages were held in the hills and the heavy rains made it even more challenging. But the lady duo stuck to the middle of the rocky roads. “The last nine kilometers were really taxing as it was downhill. But we went a little slowly and came home safe,” Purohit exclaimed.
vishal@newindianexpress.com
Results: Ultimate Cars: 1) Suresh Rana/ Ashwin Naik (6:59:02); 2 Samrat Yadav/SN Nizami (7:00:15); 3 Sandeep Sharma/Karan Arya (7:05:46). Ultimate Bikes: 1) R Nataraj (4:29:30); 2 Abdul Wahid Tanveer (4:31:26); 3 Sanjay Kumar (4:35:57).