Sarah Kashyap has spent the last few months learning how to survive in a desert. Apart from training to toughen her body to handle the heat, she has been spending time with Army personnel posted in desert environments to better understand how to handle the conditions. She says all this preparation is necessary, as for the better part of eight days, she has to ride a heavily modified KTM Duke 200 over the desert sands of Rajasthan, competing with the best in the business at the Maruti Suzuki Desert Storm Rally.
“I’ve been riding for over a decade and in 2014 I entered Royal Enfield Ridermania to try out competitive riding, and finished fourth out of ten. That’s when I realised I could try my hand at motorsport,” says Sarah, who spent six years in the UK donning many roles, from bartender to social worker. She eventually settled in Chennai and took up a job she found thanks to expatcareers.com with Royal Enfield as assistant manager in their Rides and Community Department.
With a desire to get into motorsport, she went on to participate in the Sojoba Rally, and entered a few other events before taking part in the challenging Raid de Himalaya, the world’s highest rally raid. Sarah chose to enter the event (traditionally the domain of custom adventure machines like the KTM she is currently riding in Desert Storm), with her own Royal Enfield motorcycle. “I’ve always had a passion for the brand, and participating in the Raid de Himalaya on my own motorcycle was always on my bucket list. By choosing the Enfield I knew I would multiply the difficulty factor, but that was a challenge I wanted.” Despite having to ride 200 kilometres with a broken collarbone, she went on to complete the event.
She agrees that the idea of a woman riding a motorcycle should not be considered unusual anymore. “Once you are on a motorcycle, it is about skin and bone, not gender. There is just you and the machine. People ask ‘how do you cope when you fall down on an incline, and everyone does fall’, but I have no problems lifting the motorcycle and carrying on. It is all in the mind.”
One thing she does lament is the lack of more female participation in motorsport, which she attributes to a general lack of awareness as much as the gender stigma. “One of my lifelong inspirations is Laia Sanz (a Spanish multiple world champion in women’s trials). She has the position of being the women’s champion but I can’t say that unless more women enter the sport. Of course, it is great to compete in the mixed category and go up against the best overall, but it goes both ways,” she says, adding that the lack of coverage for motorsport in India makes it difficult to get sponsors, regardless of how well-respected the athlete might be in the sport. Her motorsport career is currently managed by Bengaluru-based motorcycle rental service provider Wicked Ride.
Sarah is looking forward to being at the finish line of Desert Storm, which has well-known talents like C.S. Santosh and Aravind K.P. participating. “I’m the only woman motorcyclist at the event and the conditions are challenging. If you get stuck, you have to be able to find your way out, even if it means riding on the rim of a punctured tyre. The finish rate is usually 30-40 per cent of those who started on day one, and I hope to be there at the end.”
The Desert Storm rally is currently underway and set to culminate on April 10 at Jodhpur.
source : thehindu.com
