Defending champion Tanveer wins season opener

It was the defending champion Tanveer from Mysuru who edged out Shlok Ghorpade from Satara with a 32sec winning margin in the season opener of the MRF MOGRIP fmsci Indian National Rally Championship 2026 held in Coimbatore, promoted by Godspeed and organised by CASC.

Superbike Pro-expert upto 500cc GroupA: First time a second manufacturer entered the fray in the highlight class which was always dominated by TVS Racing. Both the teams brought in young blood from Supercross into rallying as their debut event. It was never easy for experienced Tanveer who climbed up to Dakar right from  Dirt track  to come face to face with the young Shlok Ghorpade who is been trained abroad to take on Dakar for the upcoming season.

This class saw some intensive fight right from the first stage, Shlok Vikram Ghorpade from Heromotorsports in his debut rally began with an excellent start being the fastest in the first stage by over a second on the Petronas TVS Racing rider Abdul Wahid Tanveer. In the second stage with a 15sec lead Tanveer was the new leader as Shlok had a crash in this stage and later on Tanveer dominated both the remaining stages to win the class, Shlok had a similar repeat crash in the final stage as well and was lucky enough to hold on to second position, by managing to keep Samuel Jacob from Petronas TVS Racing in third position with less than a second margin. While his two teammates Rajendra RE with over 7sec difference missed the podium, Rajendra stood third till the final stage where he lost about 10sec and had to settle for fourth, Rugved Barguje from Pune in his Debut rally finished in fifth position.

Defending his title in the Superbike Expert upto 500cc GroupA and being fastest in all the stages was the VM Motorsports rider Nataraj R who won the class with a 2min 21sec lead over his teammate Naresh VS, who was continuously losing time in all the stages, Bengaluru Privateer Amogh Nag GS with a 31sec deficit completed the podium. Recovering from leg injury Sanjay Somashekar also a privateer from Bengaluru with 6sec difference finished fourth.

Three Bengaluru riders from VM Motorsprots dominated the podium of Supersport upto 165cc GroupB.. Nithyan L was the leader with over 36sec lead, Bharath L who tried making a comeback after losing time in stage one had to finish second, Varun Kumar R with 1min 36sec further difference finished in third. Two Shivamogga privateers Darpan D and Dheeraj H finished in fourth and fifth position.

With a 42sec lead and dominating all the four stages Imran Pasha from Petronas TVS Racing won the Supersport in the 165 to 250cc GroupB class, Karan Kumar M from Hero Motorsports stood second, Sachin D from Petronas TVS Racing with further 37sec difference finished third. Banteilang Jyrwa from Petronas TVS Racing and Jayden W M Nongkhlaw from Hero Motorsports finished in fourth and fifth with 17sec and 14sec difference respectively. Jeevarathinam J a privateer from Bengaluru finished sixth.

In the Supersport 260 to 400cc GroupB class it was Stephen Roy from Kushalnagar winning with a 18sec lead, Coimbatore's Sabarish R from VM Motorsports finished in second position, his temamate Bengaluru boy Hemanth M  with further 19sec held on to podium. Localite Venu Ramesh Kumar a privateer finished in fourth and privateer Rajesh Kumar M from Bengaluru with 11sec difference finished fifth.

Top three position in the Scooters upto 210cc GroupB belonged to Petronas TVS Racing riders. Syed Asif Ali with a total time of 56min 36sec was the winner, Shamim Khan was 1min 6sec slower and had to settle for second, Karthik N with a further 46sec difference finished on the podium in third. Bengalurian Gourthm N and Pune's Pinkesh Thakkar both from VM Motorsports finished in fourth and fifth position respectively.

Aishwarya Pissay from Petronas TVS Racing defended her title by winning the Women's class upto 460cc class by a margin of 25sec over the Hero Motorsports rider Somyya Chaudhary who finished second.

Coimbatorian Karthick A from VM Motorspors with 57sec lead was the winner of the Superstock 165 to 260cc GroupD, privateer Pradeep C from Bengaluru finished second and Pavan BK also a privateer from Bengaluru finished third with 4sec difference. Coimbatore privateer Saravana Kumar K finished fourth with 23sec difference and Vikram Sekhar from VM Motorsports with 1min 4sec difference finished in fifth.

Sreekanth Komana from Kochi with a total time of 57min 14sec  was the winner of Superstock 260 to 450cc GroupD class, Thangaraj S from Coimbatore had to settle for second position after missing the top slot by just over one second difference, Karthikeyan Dhanabal from Coimbatore with further 2min 27sec difference finished third. Ashish Kumar from Bengaluru finished in fourth.

In the Star of Tamilnadu Deepan Kumar S from Namakkal was the winner, with a difference of 20sec Gowtham S from Coimbatore finished second, Barani Visak R also from Coimbatore finished third with a further 42sec difference. Suresh Mani and Sankar S from Palladam and Kethanur finished in fourth and fifth position respectively.