JK Tyre's Gaurav Gill, the only Indian on the grid of 70 of world's best rally drivers, is gearing up for one of the toughest and gruelling rallies in the World Rally Championship (WRC) calendar-Acropolis Rally Greece scheduled from September 8-11.
This will be Gill's third outing in the WRC this year along with co-driver Gabriel Morales from Brazil after the duo delivered some impressive performances in Kenya and Finland.
Popularly known as the Rally of the Gods, the event will cover a total distance of 1192km including 16 Special stages of 303 kms.
With soaring summer temperatures in Acropolis, the stages of Elatia, Bauxites and Tarzan will become even more daunting as the drivers and their cars can succumb to the twisty, dusty, rock-strewn mountain roads.
On Thursday, the iconic Olympic Stadium in Athens will host a 2 km quick fire opener super special stage where cars will run two-at-a-time infront of 60K expected crowd which will act as the prelude to the three days of intense competition that follows.
After tasting victory in the Indian soil in Round 2 of the FMSCI Indian National Rally Championship - Rally of Coimbatore in his 220 HP & 300NM Mahindra XUV 300, Gill straightway headed to Finland and was quick to adapt to his 290 HP & 425 NM Skoda Fabia R5 Rally 2 car.
He had a memorable outing in Rally Finland where not only did he successfully finish the rally, but barring the 5 stages which got him scratch time due to fuel pump issues, in the remaining 17 stages, Gill was on an average 20-25 seconds off the leader in his category per 10kms.
Gill showed the grid of finest rally drivers that how good he is at taming tough terrains.
"I'm really excited to be part of this legendary Acropolis Rally. We've had a great pre-event test through the rough gravel tracks of Greece. We have to brave high temperatures, dust and rocky passes going into the rally, but we're geared up for that challenge," said Arjuna Awardee Gill.
