EZY Racing completes dominant year in 2012

If ever there was a motor racing team that made its presence felt across every racing track in Sri Lanka, it was EZY Racing who achieved this feat with a phenomenal show of prowess during 2012.

The black and red clad team who entered the sport in 2010, completed their third year in motor racing in the most successful manner ever achieved in sports history when they went on to win 59 podium finishes, which included 25 wins and 34 finishes in second and third place. EZY Racing, which is fast becoming a household brand in the country, reached newer heights in motor racing through their strong driver/rider combination which was a treat to watch.

The team, which participated in every race in the motor racing calendar for 2012, went into the season with a strong driver combination lead by 2011 National Gravel Champion Pasindu Peiris, 2010 Rally Champion Shafraz Junaid, 2009 Rally Champion Rizvi Farouk, as well as Sajaad Zuhair, who together with the Wonder Kids of Motor Cycle Racing, Jaden and Aaron Gunawardane and the entertaining and undisputed ‘biker’ Shrian Samuels, gave local spectators a treat!

The seven member team became a much awaited phenomenon on the race track, not merely because of their sheer driving prowess, but also due to the entertainment they provided the thousands of spectators, by becoming the most frequent team on the podium.

“This I believe is a feat achieved by no other in Sri Lankan motor racing team, at least to my knowledge in the recent past,” said a buoyant Team Principal Shafraz Hamzadeen, who is also the Managing Director/CEO of EZY Motor Racing Corporation.

EZY Racing began the season with Pasindu Peiris winning the Carlton Super Cross and continuously visited the podium thereafter. The EZY racing team also had the rare opportunity of completing an all podium race weekend where every driver/rider of theirs won a podium finish in their respective race events of the race weekend, first at the Kandy Night Race when the black and red team lit the Kandy streets by dominating the race. They later on went to repeat this effort in four other races which again is believed to be a record feat.

Reviewing the year, Hamzadeen said, “Although our achievements are quite remarkable, it was definitely not an easy year by any means. We had a lot of challenges where some of our drivers were eternally under scrutiny. Furthermore, we had continuous work on the cars due to the excessive wear and tear and race damage occurred in the gravel races on the cars, which took quite a hard toll while running competitively.

“This required the drivers and the support staff to work overtime for a good part of the season. In addition to this, we faced a very unfortunate incident when our leading driver Pasindu Peiris was suspended for one year, which I believe hampered us from bagging a few more places. However, the strength of our team was clearly evident when we continued to bag more podiums in spite of Pasindu’s absence. So when you consider these challenges and look at the year from a 360 degree view, I would say that our achievement is much more remarkable than it looks.”

The most number of wins for EZY Racing was recorded by Shrian Samuels with eight visits to the top step while Sajaad Zuhair had seven wins for the season.

“The motor racing calendar is quite a challenging one in Sri Lanka. The most challenging part is when you have two to three races a month and that too on different terrains, especially running gravel which needs a lot of resources, as well as managing the car and the team’s motivation is not an easy task! Having five different people contributing to the wins under these circumstances is a great feeling and speaks volumes of our team’s competitive strength.

“Shrian had a commendable record in winning eight times in the four races he participated in. Sajaad was more like the backbone of the team ensuring that the team’s flag was carried in every race. He won seven times which again is a tremendous achievement.”

According to Hamzadeen, however, the real unsung heroes are the chaps who are behind the scene doing all the hard work in order for the drivers to do well. “I must thank Hassan Alaldeen who leads our support staff as the race manager for his great leadership in motivating and inspiring a long queue of people to give their very best.”

EZY Racing, which is currently entering its fourth year in professional motor sports, recently further strengthened their driver line up by signing on Dilan Seneviratne, who has been a very strong contender in the SLH 1600CC category. Speaking about the 2013 racing outlook, Hamzadeen went on to state that Dilan’s addition would bring variation to the team as Dilan is viewed as being a very strong tarmac driver and a fearless competitor.

“Managing a season that is as long as the number of months in a calendar is not an easy task. We not only need to manage driver/rider motivation and fatigue, but also need to ensure that the support staff motivation is very high and that the cars are always competitive. I would say that we would never have achieved this without the support of our sponsors.

“In order to develop a more sustainable model, we are looking at changing our approach in 2013, where we will categorise our team into three different sub teams, where we will have a set of gravel specialists, tarmac specialists and rally specialists. This way we believe we will be able to manage our resources much more efficiently,” added Hamzadeen.

More insights into EZY Racing and its 2013 journey can be viewed on their fan page www.facebook.com/ezyracing, which recently crossed 26,000 fans.