In a field as competitive and misanthropic towards finances, success in motorsport is as good as gold dust. We often hear stories of grit, determination and patience, of athletes that spend decades chasing a target and eventually achieving it. The same can’t be said for motorsport.
The urgency and pressure conjured by financial constraints create an extremely demanding situation of delivering success – quickly. Perhaps that is why racing drivers are a completely different and probably supernatural breed of humans. Driving is just one aspect of their complex daily jobs.
This urgent need for success can be satisfied by few, who manage to find a way past the labyrinth regardless of the gravity of the challenges imposed on them. Such athletes are as rare as diamonds in the crust – its all down to discovering them and polishing the rough edges.
Sohil Shah (in the racing suit) has entered Indian motorsport with a bang
Speaking of diamonds in the rough, one very promising Indian racing driver in Sohil Shah comes to mind. In only two full seasons, the eighteen year-old from Bangalore has won the MRF FLGB 1300 championship and has finished second in the MRF F1600 championship, not to mention that he finished as the second runner up in the 1300s while fighting for the title in the more advanced 1600 championship too. Its almost as if a new actor has entered the box office and has produced two instant hits of the same genre.
This is where challenge escalates.
What happens when the actor decides to try a new genre? What happens when the driver takes a step up the racing ladder and competes internationally? Will success flow by as smoothly as it previously did? How much will the rising pressure compounded by the significance of the occasion impact him?
For Sohil Shah, this test came in the form of his first ever international race weekend in the Formula 4 South East Asian Championship at the Sepang Circuit in Malaysia. Fresh off a very positive domestic season, Sohil went into his biggest challenge yet with a great deal of enthusiasm and resolve and in the end, it all seemed to pay off.
Sohil competed in his first ever International race weekend at the Sepang Circuit in the F4 SEA Championship
After an entire week full of understanding a new circuit and a new car which required an entirely different philosophy of driving, the laptimes started to tumble and the performances improved race after race. A solid drive in Race 1 saw Sohil sailed home in P5. The following race demanded much more of him on the defensive side of things; as if adapting to a completely new style of braking wasn’t easy enough, Sohil was attacked by the more experienced drivers in the pack and after a race full of hard defending, a decent fifth place finish was the end result once again.
Then came the big shift; after being mentored by two extremely experienced gentlemen in the form of Mitch Gilbert and Aditya Patel, two GT Drivers that know what it takes to be a great racing driver, you could see the shift in Sohil’s driving. This was the stage of polishing off the rough edges – the long hours spent mentoring Sohil and making him aware about the right style of driving eventually paid off as the diamond finally started to shine and Sohil achieved a monumental maiden International podium in Race 3.
Battling hard with the front runners in the race, Sohil persevered and clocked in impressive lap times while dealing with the sturdy competition. The challenge was to keep the pace up while avoiding any silly incidents, which can be quite a task at times and that turned out to be the mantra to success – helping Sohil to secure an elusive international podium place finish with a strong second place finish.
Sohil achieved his first ever International podium in only his third ever race out of India
Speaking to an elated Sohil after the race, I was easily able to sense his joy of getting a podium on his first shot.
However, you could sense that he wasn’t satisfied with merely one podium in the entire weekend. That is the mentality of a top athlete; for them, even good isn’t good enough.
In the end, you win on some days and you learn on the others and Sohil was the first to admit that the takeaways from his experience in the F4 SEA Championship were fairly significant. A very thrilling project in the domestic season awaits an ever-improving Sohil Shah, who, just like a promising actor doing well in the box office, now wants to dominate it. A couple of very exciting and extremely crucial years seem to be in store for Sohil.
Watch out for him – you wouldn’t want to miss even a single step of his journey to the top.
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