Round 2 of the Indian National Rally Championship had no broadcast deal and no factory-backed cars, but it produced the closest finish of the season so far, and a genuine subplot: the winner had skipped half the season to chase a world title in South America.
Dean Mascarenhas and co-driver Gagan Karumbaiah won the Blueband Sports Rally of Coimbatore, Round 2 of the 2026 Indian National Rally Championship (INRC), on September 20, beating Round 1 winner Karna Kadur and his co-driver Musa Sherif by 23.482 seconds. Mascarenhas crossed the line in 1 hour, 36 minutes and 19.777 seconds. Six days earlier, he and Karumbaiah were on a different continent, wrapping up a World Rally Championship 3 (WRC3) campaign at Rally Chile Bio Bio.
How Coimbatore Was Actually Won
Kadur and Sherif of ARKA Motorsports were fastest on both of Saturday’s stages and started Sunday with a 5.6-second lead. Mascarenhas and Karumbaiah, third overnight and more than nine seconds back, turned it around on the Black Thunder (R) stage, taking over 14 seconds out of Kadur in that single run. From there, Mascarenhas was quicker through to the finish.
| Position | Crew | Team | Result |
| 1st | Dean Mascarenhas / Gagan Karumbaiah | Not disclosed in results | 1:36:19.777 |
| 2nd | Karna Kadur / Musa Sherif | ARKA Motorsports | +23.482s |
| 3rd | Jason Saldanha / Srinivas Murthy P V | ARKA Motorsports | Not disclosed |
Sixty-four cars and 128 competitors started across 110.80 km of competitive gravel, split into two stages, Black Thunder and S.M. Agro, run four times each over the weekend inside a 153.36 km route. Eight classes ran alongside the main INRC category: INRC 2, INRC 3T, INRC 3, the FMSCI Gypsy Challenge, Classic Challenge, Masters Cup, and dedicated Women and Junior categories. Fabid Ahmer and co-driver Milen George, who had been running inside the top three, retired on the final stage.
Why Mascarenhas Wasn’t Even Meant to Be Racing in India Right Now
Mascarenhas and Karumbaiah, who race internationally for TSI Racing, skipped Round 1 of the 2026 INRC in Chennai back in April to fund a WRC3 campaign instead. That campaign hit a rough patch: the pair crashed out of Rally del Paraguay in August after stage-20 accident damage to their Ford Fiesta Rally3, a result this site covered at the time. They recovered for a top-eight finish and a stage win at Rally Chile Bio Bio, which ran September 10 to 13, then flew home and won an Indian rally six days later, a genuinely unusual double for a crew that treated a domestic round with little prize money as a tune-up.
Karna Kadur Has Now Been Beaten Once, and Only Once
Kadur, a former national champion, won Round 1’s 49th South India Rally in Chennai (April 17-19) with co-driver Kumar Ramaswamy, a round that also carried Asia-Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) Asia Cup points. Three-time APRC champion Gaurav Gill set the early pace, but Kadur’s crew held on despite a turbo issue on the final day that cost them close to a minute. Ritesh Guttedar and Suraj M were second overall and won the INRC 2 class; Arvind Dheerendra and Shahid Salman were third.
| Position | Crew | Note |
| 1st | Karna Kadur / Kumar Ramaswamy | Turbo issue cost about a minute on the final day |
| 2nd | Ritesh Guttedar / Suraj M | Also won the INRC 2 class |
| 3rd | Arvind Dheerendra / Shahid Salman | Rounded out the podium |
No official 2026 INRC points standings have been published as of this writing, so where the six-round title fight actually stands after two rounds is not yet public information, only the raw results are. On results alone, Kadur has a win and a second place, Mascarenhas has a win, and the two crews have now beaten each other exactly once each.
Why an Unwatched Gravel Rally Still Matters to India’s Car and Bike Buyers
INRC is the only structured, multi-round domestic proving ground India has for the skill international rally raid actually rewards: reading a road you cannot see coming, at speed, for two days straight. It runs with no broadcast deal and no manufacturer works team behind any of the crews named here; results travel through wire copy and enthusiast forums, not prime-time sport. The FMSCI Gypsy Challenge, one of eight classes run at Coimbatore, is still built around Maruti Suzuki’s original rally workhorse, the vehicle that took over from the Premier Padmini as India’s default gravel car in the late 1980s and taught a generation of Indian rally crews, Gill included, to read a loose surface before they ever sat in four-wheel-drive machinery.
“Pace notes were everything this weekend, especially on Sunday when the gaps were so small. Dean trusted every call, and that made all the difference.”
Gagan Karumbaiah, co-driver, after the Coimbatore win.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the Indian National Rally Championship (INRC)?
It is India’s national gravel rally series, run by the Federation of Motor Sports Clubs of India (FMSCI) across a season of closed-stage gravel rounds, separate from circuit racing series like Formula 4 India. The 2026 season is a six-round calendar that opened with the South India Rally in Chennai in April.
Who won Round 2 of the 2026 INRC in Coimbatore?
Dean Mascarenhas and co-driver Gagan Karumbaiah won the Blueband Sports Rally of Coimbatore on September 20, 2026, beating Round 1 winner Karna Kadur and his co-driver Musa Sherif by 23.482 seconds after trailing overnight.
Where can I follow INRC results?
INRC has no regular television broadcast. Results are reported through wire copy from agencies like ANI, by specialist outlets such as Autocar India, and through FMSCI’s own event bulletins; there is no single live-results app built for casual fans yet.
