The Southern Motor Sports Club (SMSC) is gearing up to hold their motor car rally event which is being held for the 11th successive time, scheduled for October 16 and 17.
This motor car rally termed as the Southern Monsoon Rally and the “Taste of wilderness of the South” along the multi faceted tracks comprising the tar, concrete and gravel tracks along with the faraway jungles is going to be a challenging journey for the drivers and his co-driver.
 Professor Oscar Amarasinghe one of the die hard members of the SMSC giving a short briefing of the club stated that the SMSC came into existence in 1997 due to the efforts put in by some enthusiastic motor racing fans in the southern district. “The objective of forming the SMSC was to promote, develop and take motor sports to greater heights and with that in mind we obtained the membership of the SLAS formerly known as SLAM which is the governing body of motor sports in Sri Lanka.
“We are proud to say that we have achieved what we intended doing and it’s first president the veteran motor car racing driver Suranjith Premadasa who is a household name in the motor racing fraternity along with his committee members laid the solid foundation for that. This year too there is no doubt that Southern Monsoon Rally will be held with much fanfare, pomp and pageantry with the participation of Sri Lanka’s top drivers who have confirmed their participation.”
Twenty-six, drivers along with their co-drivers are listed to take part in this grueling almost 600km rally event which will cover five districts namely Matara, Galle, Hambantota, Ratnapura and Monaragala.
Professor Amarasinghe further stressed that the route plot done by another veteran in Andrew Silva is no doubt going to be a challenging journey for the participants.
The Time-Speed-Distance (TSD) rally event which SMSC introduced for the first time in Sri Lanka in 2001 is scheduled to be flagged off from the Sanath Jayasuriya Stadium on October 16 at 7.00 p.m.
Professor Amarasinghe emphasized that the international TSD format allows for rallies to be run on open roads as all aspects of time, speed and distance are controlled. This will require each competitor besides following a set route using professional rally computers.
This will ease to maintain ‘set speeds’ that are given priority to the rally. The ‘set speeds’ are specified by the rally organizers based on the road terrain, possible weather condition, urban/non urban area and legal speed limits.
It will be interesting as the competitors will be tested for their precision driving and not speed. This is accomplished through a series of checkpoints/time controls at unspecified locations along the route.
Further each competitor will be penalized through a debit point system for not maintaining the set course, duration and speed. The winner will finally would be the competitor with the least amount of debit points.
The Southern Monsoon Rally will be held in three stages with the first being from Matara to Middeniya which will cover 60 percent of tarred, 20 percent of concrete and another 20 percent of gravel tracks. This stage will cover 188kms with the first car expected to arrive at 11.00 p.m.
The second stage will be from Middeniya to Weeravila which will be flagged off at 1.00 a.m. covering 201kms which comprises of 25 percent tarred, 15 percent concrete and 60 percent gravel. The first vehicle is expected at 5.30 a.m.
The third and final stage will be from Weeravila to Matara which will be flagged off at 9.00 a.m. on October 16 covering 203kms comprising of 50 percent tarred, 10 percent concrete and the rest gravel. The first vehicle is expected at 3.00 p.m. In all the participants will cover 31 towns in the five districts of Matara, Galle, Hambantota, Ratnapura and Monaragala.
The curtain of the Southern Monsoon Rally sponsored by Sri Lanka Insurance with co-sponsors being Mobitel, Castrol, Good Year, Browns, Pan Asia Bank, AMW Suzuki and Premier International will come down with a glittering award ceremony due to be held at the Sanath Jayasuriya Stadium in Matara on October 17 at 7.30 p.m. |
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