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TEAM Top
Gear Magazine was formally crowned overall team champion
of the 2007 Honda Media Challenge during the annual
awards night held on February 15 at the Forum Hall of
the Airport Casino Filipino.
Composed
of Carmela Ortiz, Beeboy Bargas and Paolo Subido, the
champion team garnered a total of 84 points after
bagging the first two legs and placing third in the
final leg. They beat Team BusinessMirror composed of
Andy Sevilla, Randy Cabangon and Dino Datu, which bagged
second place with 81 points and placed second in the
first leg, fourth in the second and won the third and
final leg.
In third
place was Team Auto Review composed of Ronald de los
Reyes, Kit Joaquin and Alvin Ng with 72 points.
Gallant effort rewarded.
Team
BusinessMirror’s Andy Sevilla, Dino Datu and Randy
Cabangon (not in photo) receive their trophies from
Honda Cars Philippines president Hiroshi Shimizu (left)
and Yokohama Tires president Takkuji Asano
On the
other hand, Subido also captured the Best Driver award
in the Motoring category with a total of 72 points,
while his teammate Vargas finished third. Ferman Lao of
Kotse.com was second. Onyl Malabanan of Honda Club
Philippines swept all three rounds of the series to
capture the top spot in the Exhibition category. The
winners received trophies, medals and numerous prizes.
The
event departed from the circuit format of the past two
seasons. Last year’s format was an Autokhana, combining
the autocross and gymkhana motorsports disciplines. It
evened out the competition since emphasis was on driver
skill and vehicle handling, combining both speed and
precision driving. The challenge and excitement came
from the ingenious track layouts with many twists and
turns, which required strong mental concentration.
Six
Honda Jazz VTEC 1500 manual-transmission units, equipped
with roll cages, racing seat and five-point harness,
were used as official competition vehicles. They were
fitted with Yokohama Tires and Motolite batteries, while
the official fuel was the new Petron XCS Complete
Combustion System, a special formulation customized for
Philippine driving conditions.
Other
sponsors included Honda Philippines Inc. for the
generator sets, Pagcor Sports, JVC Mobile Entertainment
Systems, Art & Image Technology for the car stickers and
IgerTech for the timing device and scoring system. The
Honda Media Challenge is an annual club event sanctioned
by the Automobile Association Philippines and organized
by ADBM Resources. For more information about the
event, call 920-6944 or visit
www.mediachallenge.info. |
