KUALA LUMPUR, July 19 — The first event for the Vios Challenge will be held at Batu Kawan, Penang, on August 12 and 13 this year – and in the field of more than thirty drivers, twenty four of them would be newbie racers who have just graduated from a race driving course organised by Toyota Racing Development (TRD) Japan.

The racing course ended with a graduation ceremony and handing out of certificates of competency, held at the Sepang International Circuit today by Mr. Ravindran Kurusamy, President of UMT Toyota Motor Sdn Bhd. Amongst the twenty-four drivers are eight celebrity drivers including actors Fattah Amin, Diana Danielle, Shukri Yahya and Janna Nick, singers Geraldine Gan and Danny Khoo, blogger and model Venice Min and beatboxer Shawn Lee. Also receiving his certificate of competency was Akio Takeyama, Deputy Chairman of UMW Toyota motor who will join the celebrities in the Promotional Category of the Vios Challenge.

"Achieving success on the race track is about finding the limits of both the individual and machine collectively. No component can outpace the other. By arming these drivers with racing skills, we hope that they will better exploit the sporting potential of their Toyota Vios racing cars safely and responsibly,” said Mr. Ravindran at the graduation ceremony.

The Vios Challenge will be made up of three categories – Super Sporting Category for those with a ‘successful’ racing record, Sporting Category for new drivers and drivers who do not fall into the Super Sport Category, while the balance will be in the Promotional Category.

The Batu Kawan Vios Challenge will be run in a clockwise direction on a 1.65 kilometre course carved out in the stadium car park. It features nine turns, with the longest straight a shade over 156 metres – qualifying times will be crucial, and with the many concrete barriers and what I think will be a narrow track, this is a race not to be missed.

To make things more exciting, the top six finishers in any race will have to do a ‘position switch’ for the next race – i.e., the winner has to start win 6^th grid, the runner up in fifth grid, while the second runner up will be in fourth grid and so on, with the sixth finisher on pole. In addition, the winners have to carry ballast, or weight penalty for the next race. The ballast can be as high as 20kg, which will have a small effect on the lap times.

The race activity will be held on August 12^th and 13^th, in conjunction with the Toyota Gazoo Racing (TGR) Festival – the Festival is open to members of the public for free and there will be many activities including drift shows, celebrity performances, food trucks, test drives and a special showcase of the soon to be launched Toyota C-HR.

As part of the graduation program, the attending media were given an opportunity to check out the racing Vios. I took it out for a sighting lap, two hot laps followed by a cooling down lap on the North circuit (2.61 km). Even with the engine in stock condition, the Vios is an exciting enough car to drive around the circuit. The sports exhaust gives it a throaty roar, and the engine revs up to 6,300 rpm, with usable power up to 6,000rpm. It feels like there is a competition clutch as the bite is pretty good whenever I changed up or down. After the initial take-off in first, the usable gears around the Sepang Circuit are second through to fifth, with fifth being snatched for a couple of seconds on the front straight on the North track. Turn one is taken in third, but with some limitations caused by the tyres, sometimes you have to change down to second midway through to have a fast enough exit. Then it’s up through the gears to fourth halfway through turn three, and down again to third for the right-hander at turn four. After that it is accelerating up the hill in third, and shifting up to fourth to take turn six, after which it is third again for the two turns to get you back to the front straight.

The Vios race car is a very well set up piece of machinery, thanks to the experience gained from similar race events held in other ASEAN countries. Handling is very predictable, and the car is very stable under braking. The engine is near standard in specifications (approximately 110ps), but there is enough power for it to be fun, and it is a good car for developing new drivers. On the other hand, veteran drivers will have to work extra hard to extract the most out of the car using their driving skills in order to win. Due to the fact that the cars are relatively low powered, the differences in lap times is likely to be in fractions of seconds, so even the leader of the pack is likely to have the rest snapping very closely at his or her heels – it is going to be an interesting series – see you in Batu Kawan.