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TEAM
BusinessMirror, whose drivers took a “no-more-tomorrow”
stance, took victory in the third and final leg of the
2007 Honda Media Challenge on December 9 at the FTI
Complex in
Taguig City.
Composed
of Randy Cabangon, Dino Datu and Andy Sevilla, Team
BusinessMirror submitted an aggregate team time of
3:57.02 after a challenging whole-day, two-heat
competition to emerge as the third leg champions. It
garnered 30 big points against the 27 of Team Auto
Review’s Ronald de los Reyes, Kit Joaquin and Alvin Ng,
which placed second with an aggregate team time of
3:59.02.
“The
spirit of the team was very high as we approached the
third and final leg of the series. I give it to the two
new faces in the team for a job well done. These two
rookies delivered the most during crunch time. They
handled the pressure very well,” said team captain Andy
Sevilla, whose team finished a strong second in the
first leg and third in the second leg.
Smokin’!
Randy Cabangon of Team
BUSINESSMIRROR attacks the course during the third round
of the 2007 Honda Media Challenge.
However,
the winning effort of BusinessMirror was not enough to
overtake the leader, Top Gear Magazine, which bagged the
overall crown with a narrow three-point margin in what
was billed as one of the most hotly contested
championships in the annual driving competition among
members of the media that is now on its ninth year.
Top Gear
Magazine placed third in the third and final leg to
snatch 24 points courtesy of its three drivers, Carmela
Ortiz, Beeboy Bargas and Paulo Subido, who topped the
individual overall category. It beat by .11 seconds Team
Autoindustriya (Brent Co, Vic Rosales and Rick Wee),
which checked in fourth with 66 points.
Motoring
Today (Arlene Ronquillo, Matt Mallari and Ray Luis
Gamboa) finished fifth followed by Radio-FM (Lamber
Cruz, Tom Garcia and Allan Sevilla, the individual
champion of the third leg), sixth; DZRH (Jess Garcia,
Deo Macalma and Erick San Pedro), seventh; Radio-AM
(Angelo Almonte, Ricky Velasco and Cristy Dailo),
eighth; Gadgets Magazine (Val Villamar, John Nieves and
Maynard Marcelo), ninth; Manila Standard Today (Dino
Directo, Love-Love Tioseco, Sonny Espiritu), 10th; and
BusinessWorld (Barbara Lorenzo, Anton Dizon and Ikka de
Guzman), 11th.
Meanwhile, Allan Sevilla of Radio-FM was declared the
best driver of the day with 1:11.40, followed by Top
Gear’s Paolo Subido with 1:12.29 and Speed Magazine’s
Manny Angeles who stopped the clock at 1:13.20, in this
competition that departed from the circuit format of the
past two seasons in favor of an autokhana, combining the
autocross and gymkhana motorsport disciplines.
Subido
emerged as the overall champion with 72 points followed
by kotse.com’s Ferman Lao with 63 and Beeboy Bargas with
60. In the Honda Club Division, Onyl Malabanan swept all
three legs and emerged the overall champion.
A club
event sanctioned by the Automobile Association
Philippines and organized by ADBM Resources, the Honda
Media Challenge was sponsored by Petron XCS Complete
Combustion System, Honda Philippines Inc., Pagcor
Sports, JVC Mobile Entertainment Systems, Art & Image
Technology and IgerTech.
The six
Honda Jazz VTEC 1500 M/T units were equipped with roll
cages, racing seat and five-point harness. They were
also fitted with Yokohama Tires and Motolite batteries. |
