Mangalore: 7-year-old Ruhaan Alva goes places with go-karting
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangalore
Mangalore, Oct 23: Go-karting as a professional sport may not be too popular with Mangalorean youth, but Ruhaan Alva, an energetic 7-year-old who is passionate about driving, has already achieved great strides in this arena.
Ruhaan has the rare distinction of becoming the first Indian kid of this age to be selected by an international team to drive the Little Greenman Championship as a member of the junior team. He will be part of the Fusion Motorsport team which is currently coaching and training him.
Ruhaan currently lives in Bangalore and is a second standard student of NPS, Koramangala. At the tender age of 3, Ruhaan could identify most cars and would only eat while looking at auto magazines. His passion for cars led to his introduction to karting.
Ruhaan’s father, Umakanth Alva is also an avid motorsport enthusiast and has won a number of national and regional rallies in the Indian Rallying Championship. He now is managing the family business of property development under the name of Connect Habitats with projects in Mangalore and new launches planned in Mysore and Bangalore.
Ruhaan’s mother, Neeta Alva is a homeopathic doctor who after a corporate stint with GE and Hinduja group chose to be a full time mother and take care of both the children, Ruhaan and Shlok. She is instrumental in Ruhaan being able to catch up on his studies every time he has to travel to the UK for training and miss school. She is now following her passion for dance and is learning different styles and also teaching kids dancing.
UK-based Fusion Motorsports where he is being trained, has this to say about Ruhaan's progress: "Since his initial assessment in May 2013, Ruhaan has developed at an extremely fast rate, and is now at a standard well ahead of most other drivers of his age.
Having received 7 days training so far with Fusion Motorsport team manager Dan Hazlewood, Ruhaan has dramatically closed the time deficit to the more experienced drivers. Having started off around 20 seconds off in very unfamiliar surroundings, on his second visit to the UK, the 7-year-old showed his capabilities to listen and learn and halved the gap each day, until his final test a day before his
return to India, when he was only 2 seconds behind the more experienced drivers, including 12-year-olds competing for the British Championship."