Wind Beneath Thy Wings

The inaugural Red Bull Ace of Dirt event tested the skills of riders handpicked by C S Santosh via an enduro race event

- Abhishek Wairagade

C S Santosh, in association with Red Bull, created a one-off event that incorporated enduro racing along with motocross and supercross in an elimination format. 32 promising off-road riders from across the country battled for the title. They were invited by C S Santosh himself to participate in this event. These riders were chosen based on their skills, some even having competed in the Indian National Rally Championship, as well as other competitive racing championships. Finally, it was Yuva Kumar who went through the screening and managed to be the last man standing, seeing through an extremely difficult race format that saw riders being selected in a group of four to begin with. The top two riders from each of the eight heats were selected in the next round and so on. All the riders began the challenge on their motorcycles at first. The only criteria was that the machine should be completely made in India which meant we saw an ensemble of Hero Impulse, Honda Xblade, Royal Enfield Himalayan and Hero Xpulse as well. Quite a few of Hero MotoSports factory riders p