I reached back delhi late night at about 02:30 AM. Will post more pictures soon. This time the pics would be of better quality (from the camera).

Let us wish Nitinjit all the best for this.

This year the event was affected by Leh floods. They had to take out Ladakh valley from the route. However, they also collected Rs 1000 per participant (for cars that would be Rs 2000 with navigator) for Leh flood relief and Sponsors like SBI and Maruti Suzuki have also given a lumpsum donation for the relief fund.

They have also altered the first day itineary as some of the roads as planned were complete washout and construction work would be on.

The highlight though for this year was a team from Austria. The are called Team HF and came with six riders. 4 KTM's, One suzuki and one Dakar Yamaha. Yes, Dakar one! One of the riders is a two time top 10 winners at the Paris Dakar rally. I talked to the the Team manager (did not get a chance to talk to riders because of commotion) and he was pretty excited.
He said that though the team has participated in major rallies worldwide, the Raid offers the opportunity for high altitude challenge which I think is a big factor. They will have to tune these bikes (KTM's were carbs according to him but with his broken english, I could got it wrong) everyday I think depending on the leg. Also riders might have to face AMS, who knows!

They had one camera van with a dedicated camera guy off course, one service van and a team manager. So with international racing teams coming to the Raid, out riders have a tough competition.

Anyways, I spent most of the time with Nitinjit, encouraging him to try for a podium finish. I have ridden with him and man, is he fast. Wishing him luck.

As for those who have hard time reading, here are the pics


xBhpian NitinJit


Nitinjit's bike



Nitinjit at flagoff



The line up (or the lack of)



One of the very few Pulsars. Its a Pulsar 220 DTSi with rear setup of FZ


This suzuki I believe belongs to a suzuki employee Sunil told me about. I tried to locate the rider but could not.



Yes, you are right. This my friend's, is M1 of off roads!



Look at the equipment level. Can you beat that? They have a rolling road map guide!

Looks like no takers for Raid at xbhp.

Lovely to see Nitinjeet part of the Raid. All the best to him!

@Dhairya: Thanks for covering the flagging off event for xBhp.

It was my pleasure to be there.

However I feel there are very few takers for Raid on the forum! I think its because SBK's do not participate in the Raid. A SBK G2G gets more hits on xbhp than the Raid!

donot be dissapointed dhairya--people usually keep on responding to stuff that pops up on the live tracker so sometimes imp. stuff like this misses out

i am now all subscribed to this one now

cheers

@Dhairya - Good coverage there

Good to know that Nitinjit is also participating this year. Best of luck to him.

Sad to know about Vivek and Ashish

@Dhairya , awesome . More big pictures and updates when you have . And little bit more close ups of modded Indian bikes. The yellow pulsar looks tricked up .The other bikes are nicely decked up for the terrain .

Good stuff man. donno how it got missed.

as for SBK - your observation is spot on.

better to post in 5 chunks to keep it in the junta's focus

PS: The moving map is CRAZY. I want one!!

I have some more pics and will post them soon. Though most of the pics are already posted. It was towards the end of my trip and had ran out of camera memory. Had to delete a lot of pics to capture these

Yes, the yellow Pulsar is 'tricked' but not for posing. Its Purpose built. It has swing arm and suspension of the FZ. Tank is Custom as well. Though I feel that in off road riding, the fuel tank could ruin your chances of having any children.

Most of the bikes in Group D were Karizma's, a few Pulsar, one Unicorn Dazzler, some Rx100's.


Car section is still dominated by Gypsies. This time though, GM had sent their Cruze and Captiva in 'Adventure' category. I wish that HH and Bajaj entered the Raid with their own teams. I wonder why TVS did not come with a team. They are quiet active in the south.
They should be using motor sporting events to prove a product rather than hiring Hritihik Roshan to catch a Rs 50 Cap in a tornado. But then, if only marketing in India worked like I wanted it to!

Thanks Dhairya for the coverage!!

Some nice photographs!!
Best of Luck to Nitinjit. His Karizma looked beautiful in all the off road attire. Man that OffRoad Yamaha was wicked.

Would really love to see the Raid in person someday.

Waiting for more pics

Cheers!!

Great coverage Dhairya thanks

Nitinjit: All the Best brother I know you will do it....

Wat is nitinjit's xbhp id?

Today is the last day of the Raid and nitinjit is 2nd in his group. Austrians are just eating dust in Group A !