Team MRF's Gaurav Gill has a great chance of winning the season-ending Asia-Pacific Rally Championship (APRC) in Longyou (China), with the Indian leading his nearest rival by nearly 12 seconds on the second day on Saturday.
The plucky driver, who won the New Caledonia leg earlier this year, stands a great chance to beat the field — which includes World Rally Championship driver and MRF teammate Chris Atkinson — in his Skoda if he carefully negotiates the gravel tracks on the morrow.
Atkinson might have become the provisional 2012 APRC champion, after the other title contender Brian Green failed to score sufficient bonus points on Saturday, but it was Gill’s amazing driving on twisty gravel and fast concrete roads that held him in good stead on the gruelling 106km Special Stages.
Gill, who was leading by 1.8 seconds after the Super Special stage on Friday, was pushed hard by Proton’s Alister McRae, but by the end of the day everyone knew who the better driver was.