First Force Gurka Rain Forest Challenge concludes

After six days of some hardcore off-roading action, the first Force Gurkha Rain Forest Challenge finally came to an end. The event was divided into four stages - the Prologue, the Predator, the Terminator and the Twilight Zone with the level of difficulty increasing with each Special Stage. Malaysian Tang Eng Boo and co-driver Tan Choon Hong conquered it all beating fellow Malaysian Mervyn Lim and co-driver Hamizan Bin Abdul Hamid. Representing Force Motors, both teams put up a fantastic performance to take the lead right from the start and stay there right up till the end.

Kabir Waraich and Gagan Sachdeva took third place overall having moved up the points charts in the Predator stage. Being the only Indian team to finish on the podium, they will get an automatic entry into the Rainforest Challenge Malaysia 2014 which will be held in November.

Apart from the top three finishers, there were some other key awards given as well. The Lifetime Achievement award was given to veteran off-roader Uday Bhan Singh of Kolkata. Hydross Niaz and Savant Satyanarayanan from Kerala took top honours in the most unique 4x4 for their Willys FC 170. Delhi’s Bijender Singh and Jitender Singh received the Team Spirit award. Aside from these Jungleman Award and Ladies Team award were also handed out to Uday Mahatme and Rohit KR from Goa and Bangalore and Smitha Prasad and Sapna Gurukar respectively. The Environment Award went to Guhan Shetty and Ayub Khan from Tamil Nadu for being the most considerate to towards the local flora.