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Nandakumar Puspanathan

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Nandakumar Puspanathan (born 23 June 1974), is a Malaysian rally driver.

He began his rally career in the Malaysian Rally Championship 2001, driving a privately entered Proton Satria 1600. He soon gained a reputation for clocking spectacularly quick stage times, although they were sometimes accompanied by equally spectacular crashes or mechanical failures.

In 2004, Nandakumar teamed up with co-driver Suresh Parkash Sharma and the pair began chalking up class victories and top 5 overall finishes.

The pair went on to win the National 1600 Championship for the year and were awarded the “Malaysian Most Promising Rally Driver Award for 2004” by the Automobile Association of Malaysia.

The following year saw Nandakumar and Suresh Sharma contracted to factory team, Perodua M5 Racing Team.

Piloting the diminutive Perodua Kelisa 1.3 to numerous top 5 finishes overall and countless class wins showcased the talent and versatility of the pair and they went on to finish 5th overall and win the National Championship in their category in 2006.

With the introduction of the Myvi by Perodua, an experimental 1.6 litre Front wheel drive rally version made its debut in mid-2007 with Nandakumar at the wheel.

The Myvi however seemed to be constantly plagued by electrical gremlins and mechanical failures and although the pair achieved a few podium finishes in the car, there were quite a number of retirements as well.

After a transmission failure in the second round of the Malaysian Rally Championship 2008, Nandakumar was dropped by the Perodua Rally Team,citing budget cuts and race based policies as the reason for the decision. Not surprisingly, Nandakumar, a Malaysian born ethnic Indian was later replaced by rally driver Jamaludin Tukmin, an ethnic Malay.

Unfazed, Nandakumar and Suresh Sharma entered the following round in their old 1.8 litre Proton Satria as privateers and finished that round on the podium at the same time winning their class while consistently clocking faster times than their former teammate Kan Chee Hong before the latter retired.

In the following rounds, the duo managed to secure a drive with the GSR - Pennzoil Racing Team with an offer to run them as the third car in the team, making them team mates to Production World Rally Champion, Karamjit Singh and Malaysian Rally Champion Gunaseelan Rajoo.

With such an impressive line up, the Pennzoil team then proceeded to dominate the Malaysian Rally Championship at every round while Nandakumar extended his lead in the 2 wheel drive category.

The final round of the Malaysian Rally Championship 2008 at Sepang was indeed a spectacular one for the team, with Nandakumar and Suresh finishing the rally 1st in class and 3rd overall behind team mates Karamjit and Gunaseelan. Once again delivering an impressive performance to end the Malaysian Championship 2008 4th Overall and Best 2 Wheel drive.

Nandakumar is also an automotive engineer, trained by Lotus Engineering as a chassis development engineer and test driver. This helped him develop a potent combination of engineering ability and driving skill.

Sources

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