True, it’s too far-fetched a comparison, but 12-year-old Abha Mankar has all the traits to make it big
MUMBAI: At first sight, comparisons with Danica Patrick is inevitable. Abha Mankar is pretty, chirpy and looks quite rough and tough when she’s burning the rubber on the track just like the American. Don’t rub your eyes once you have read this, simply because the truth wouldn’t change!
The 12-year-old was the only girl on the track not only in the Kadet division but also the whole final leg of MRF-MAI Indian National Karting Championships held at the Acres Club, Chembur, on Sunday. And she did not disappoint the sizable crowd which was evident from the applause at the end of the race despite a fifth-place finish. In fact, that was her best finish in a racing career, which started just last year.
So what got her into racing? “I guess you will have to ask that to my father,” the Abhinav Vidyalaya English Medium School (Pune) student says. Abha’s future as a racer was decided soon after her birth. “When she was born, my friends didn’t expect me to be happy because I had a daughter. But I was partying hard,” reminisces Pramod, Abha’s father. “Then my friends asked me what she was going to do and I, under the influence of alcohol, told them she would be a F1 driver.”
Years later, when Pramod had forgotten about the incident, he happened to come across a karting event organised by DNA and Speed in Mumbai. A few days later, Abha was racing at the event and she did well to prompt her father to get her into the national karting championship. So how often had she made heads turn? “Initially, they used to wonder how can a girl race but now since I have driven quite a bit, they feel I am one of them,” she says, recounting an incident when she was bumped out of the race by a boy in a fit of rage after Abha had overtaken him.
But ask Abha, who aspires to be a veterinarian and pursue racing simultaneously, who is her favourite racer, and pat comes the reply: “Michael Schumacher.” Not surprising for someone who wants to tame the race tracks across the world like she tames animals. Yes, Abha is also an animal trainer and has trained three dogs that she has at home.
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