Someone poured water in Rajini’s bike before final race at BIC during JK Tyre FMSCI NRC

Statement by Rajini, “I was on pole in qualifying yesterday and was hoping for a good race today. Yesterday after qualifying, Someone poured water inside my petrol tank with intention of preventing me from racing.

My (2014 Kawasaki ZX10R’s) engine has been destroyed and I have been unable to take part in the race. It is a sad day in Indian Motorsports where bikes kept in a secured pit garage, is tampered with. I am very disappointed. It has never happened to me in all my years of racing either in India or abroad.

Rajni smashed the BIC record during warmup itself. No one has been below two minute mark before. Image – Sudeep Chakraborty

For my experience and achievements I did not need to race at the JK championship , I just rode so that the Delhi fans will get to see a professional superbike racer in action and to set a official lap record. But unfortunately jealous rivals don’t want that to happen.

They seem to be powerful enough to change the rules. We were told today, by the race officials that we could not race our team bikes with our tire supplier “Pirelli” stickers on the bike today. There is no rule that a tire suppliers sticker cannot be stuck on a bike. It is arbitrary rule, made overnight.

The whole episode is very depressing, hope Indian racing will not go to lower depths and discourage talented racers from racing.”

JK Tyre FMSCI National Racing Championship is the country’s premier racing series. It is surprising that something like this has happened at the highest level of Indian motorsport. This incident has not only angered Rajini, but his fans too. Rajini’s fans have voiced their opinion on social media and want the officials to go to the bottom of this and catch the culprit.

FMSCI on the other hand has said that they cannot initiate any investigation because Rajini has not made any official complaint. Taking care of the bikes is the job of the team and not officials.

No one had any answer to why the CCTV cameras in the pit was not working. Speaking about registering complaint, Rajini does not want to register a complaint as he is sure that nothing will come out of it. Instead, he will be dragged into this mess further.

Rajini added that never in his 17 year career as a pro racer, has he seen or experienced something like this.

Statement Issued to Rushlane by Team Rajini

Chorological order of events:

· On Nov 17th morning during the Official practice -1 : Rajini Krishnan was running with marked tyre 1 and had no issues on the bike regards to engine setup, but he had issues of front brake fading after 3 laps. Rajini’s fastest lap during Official practice was 1.58.3.
· On Nov 17th post lunch during qualifying : Technical crew had changed the sprockets as per rider’s feedback and worked on the front brake fading issue. Rajini’s fastest lap during qualifying 1.59.722 on lap 2 but again had front brake fading issue after 3 laps.
o Post Qualifying, Technical crew was working on the front brakes and on testing the bike, the issue was not sorted 100%. Since we were not satisfied we decided to change the complete front brake system next day morning i.e. 18th morning.
o We refuelled the bike, packed everything and moved out of the pits approximately at 19:00. We locked the front and rear pit entries to ensure safety.
· On Nov 18th morning at 8:30 before race : We opened the pit and the technical crew changed the front brake system. As per Rajini’s request, we rolled back to the previous sprocketing setup. Later, the bike was kept ready with tyre warmers ON.
· On Nov 18th during Pre- Race : We struggled to start the engine for warming before the race. We thought that bike was not starting because of the temperature outside , which made the bike go cold. After some struggle the engine started and flutters, struggling to rev over 4000 RPM. Since we had no time to open the bike, to inspect, as the pit lane was about to open, in a few minutes Rajini moves to the track, trying to warm the bike as much as possible. Rajini informed us that there is something not right in the bike and it is struggling to rev at higher RPM and the engine didn’t sound right
· On Nov 18th during the Race : After the race start, Rajini had a bad start as the bike was not responding. In lap 2, Rajini had to retire and came back to the pits.
· Post-Race Feedback : When Rajini returned to the pits he informed that the Bike did not respond properly and struggled to reach higher RPM . The bike normally revs to 14000 rpm but it was spluttering between 5000 RPM TO 11000 RPM . Bike’s Handling also was very bad as it didn’t turn/flip into the corner at all.
o We inspected the bike and we initially found that the battery terminal was loosened. We immediately went to the race control and informed them about this as we suspected someone had done this and the Official’s apologised and assured to transfer and store the bikes in a private closed garage for next day. We decided to get ready for race 2.
o We went back to fixing the issues on the bike, when we tested the bike and we found that the bike was still struggling to reach higher RPM and experienced the same RPM hit and cut of issue at 11000 RPM with harsh engine noises.
o We decided to strip the bike completely to inspect to find out the cause of the issue . After checking all electronics and mapping, we decided to check the fuel pump to find if there are any blocks in the filter. As we removed the fuel pump we found water spilling out of it and while pumping out all fuel out of the tank we found so much water in it. ( We used Bharath Petroleum- 97 Octane)
o Later while checking the suspension we found that one side of the suspension was at maximum damping while the other was at the least including the rear shocks.
We realised that our bike was sabotaged intentionally making us unable to compete anymore.
It took us more than 2 hours after the race to strip the bike and analyse the problem. So, the team at, 21:00 on Nov 18th decided to pull out of from the championship completely.

We did not file a written complaint with FMSCI at the track as we pulled out of the races and hence there was no use pursuing the matter. The matter was informed verbally with photos (attached) to Mr. Akbar Ibrahim, Mr. Sujith Kumar and Mr. Hari Singh (organising committee)

It is surprising that there are no cameras at the pits especially where such costly racing vehicles are parked.