Team-BHP - My Mughal Road Rally

Once a rallyist, always a rally addict.

Motto for this motor sport is "Real cars, real roads and real men." I know the last is a bit chauvinistic but lets ignore that for now and the import of this motto is that this sport is attempted in real cars and not some exotics that can not be used for running an errand or take your partner out for a drive. Real cars, the cars you and me drive daily. Real road means the roads built for traffic not some enclosed and specially paved circuit. Real roads in fact is euphemism for badly surfaced roads that really tear apart your car.

Ah now to explain real men. This is more to describe the toughness and endurance quotient needed for sport of rallying. Long hours of non-stop driving with fullest concentration. Do not be deluded that there is no opposition. In a rally you may not see the competition as all, including you, are racing against the common enemy - the clock. Even if you are apparently alone you are locked in fierce battle. Okay that may have been a bit too dramatic but rallying is not about sprints of speed but about dogged determination.

Please please ladies take it from me, you are included too.

From 1982 to 1994 I was always on look out for event to participate in pocket and opportunity permitting. A finish was most coveted though seldom achieved. It was pure passion that drove me to participate and con unsuspecting friends to get strapped into the passenger seat as navigator. It was all about mad dash non stop driving through roads, mud, slush, jungles, mountains and deserts during day and night.

Then in 1994 an error in judgement saw me crash badly but with grace of gods, and my wife's prayers, I survived. While the promise to reform did keep me away from being in the car, the passion kept me in close contact to the sport as an organiser. Till date, and its been more than fifteen years, the adrenaline rush to see a car being driven on the verge brings out the urge to be on the inside.

Now after all these years I am going to be on the inside again with my better half navigating me, like she does every day.

Watch this space for progress reports. And oh for those that are interested the event link is : RALLY OF THE MUGHAL ROAD

Aahhhh the lazy day arrives and both of us, me and my wife, are sipping our second cup of tea. I am already multitasking - reading the newspaper, checking my personal emails, browsing T-BHP and FB. She is also browsing. Only in her case it is the page three sections from newspapers. And she is also multi tasking. Cutting vegetables for some tasty lunch menu.

With all that multitasking going on conversation is more or less one sided. I would read out a bit of headline and grunt to express displeasure, mostly, at latest political news.....
Hah the BJP finally is getting Jharkhand CM issue resolved...@#!$
Huh Mayawati is....###%%%
Whew Income Tax web site security certificate lapsed.....morons!

Her one sided replies.....
Nice dress...Too skinny...Heels to dekho...look at the size of rock on her fingers....

You know how it goes. Neither listening to other but sharing news......

....all of sudden, despite all the multitasking, I see a post on FaceBook about a new rally being organised by J&K Tourism and almost in parallel she read something vastly more important....

Me: Interesting....
She: Haan, yes...
Me: It would be nice
She: It would be so much better
Me: Wont you agree...(rest of my sentence got lost)
She: I completely agree...
Me: What?
She: WHAT?
Me: (Trying again) This rally..
She: What rally? I agree with the writer that Sunidhi's ought to have better dress sense on Indian Idol
Me: (thinking) switch frequencies fast...(aloud) yeah I also agree that she looked horrible.
She: Her satin dress was so ugh!
Me: Ya should have been wearing hem line little higher...(ducked fast and avoided a flying potato peel thrown my way)
She: You men...even when you are fifty!! Huh..

After this bit of cerebrally taxing exchange things were quite for some time. I was sipping last of my tea and pursuing the details of rally and thinking oh what fun it would be to participate. Lost in the fantasy world....

Women have this uncanny intuition which came to fore after about fifteen minutes.....though at completely different tangent.

She: What did you say another rally?
Me: Ah..
She: As it is you are busy organising the Summer Sprint and now you are thinking of organising yet another rally.
Me: No but...
She: For you rally is more important than work
Me: This is...
She: You have been so busy that even Sunday are taken up by motorsport
Me: No no....
She: What No No you have been ignoring me and when was it...
Me; (thinking desperately how to divert the topic) Nahin yaar aisa to nahin hai kal hi to movie dekhi hai.....

This sort of loving conversation that happens between all couples. And ultimately I was able to get an edge in and the penny dropped....

Quote:

Originally Posted by sudev (Post 1899211)

This sort of loving conversation that happens between all couples. And ultimately I was able to get an edge in and the penny dropped....

Yes, been there, done that, probably you have 3x more experience of indulging in such an loving conversation.

Now i see it is becoming more interesting.. waiting to read about the moment you inducted your navigator. i am sure you used all your skills to so.

Before going further let me give you background of my better half. Her name is Alka, here-in-before referred to as "her", and she has just joined T-BHP. She says that it is to ensure that my posts are biased or one sided. May you have fun.

During our thirty plus years of knowing each other she has been supportive & dismissive of my motor sport passion to varying degrees - warm to cold. Probably warmest was when I won class finish at the Himalayan Rally and coldest was just after my crash in 1994. Understandable. Most supportive when I first participated in the Himalayan in 1982 and my eldest was all of 6 months. Most frustrated at money I spent of rallying and she never fails to remind me - "You have spent more on rallying than ever buying me anything"

Great tread Sudev sir
Till I read this thread I never knew that you were also a professional rally driver. Would love to know more about your rally years, only if we guys would have had the power of the Internet back then as we have now, I would have searched the world wide web and learned more. Today with so much technological advancements, I wouldn't say that rallying has become easier but most would agree thats its a lot more safer now compared to the early days. Hats off to you and all the rally veterans of the 80's and 90's!!! clap:
Cheers

Best of luck for the Mugal Road Rally :thumbs up
I saw you name in the list of participants for the Mugal Road but din't quite understand the mean of 'TBA' in the vehicle description.
Will be eagerly following this thread for updates.