K1000 HAM Radio communication support

12 & 13 MARCH 2022
Tumkur – Gubbi – from Nittur

The 45th Karnataka-1000 (K-1000) Rally, the second round of the FMSCI Indian National Rally Championship 2021 happened at Gubbi, about 100-km from Bangalore City. This Rally is organized by KMSC. Karnataka Motor Sports Club popularly known as KMSC is one of the oldest and premier motorsports Organization in India.

I had the opportunity to be part of the crew led Dr. Sathyapal Amateur Radio, Call Sign VU2FI, Director of Indian Institute of Hams who was designated Chief of Communications with a brilliant set of Hams and SWLs from Bangalore. This Communication troop drove as a convoy of 10 Cars and 1 Bike to the event. Rally was a 2-day event on 12th March 2022 to 13th March 2022. We reached there on 11th March.

This K1000 Rally consisted of 2 stages named as Alpha and Beta stage, each stage of approximate 15 to 16 kms. Each of the Stage has several Radio Communication points where Hams will be stationed to monitor
the happenings of the Rally by providing on-time updates to the Rally Base. Rally Base was planned at the Service Park.

The Communications team got ready by 5:30 AM and drove as a convoy to the Service Park. Radios were fitted to all officials’ vehicles and tested. Communication points for Alpha stage were Start, RP1, RP2, SOS5, SOS10 and Stop. Similarly, for Beta stage it was Start, SOS5, SOS10, SOS15 and Stop.

I was manning SOS 15 of the Beta stage, highest point of the track with nothing to shield you from blazing sun through the day. The true test of communication skills was also that this point had no mobile signals reaching (exactly the reason why radio communication is relied upon for such events) and no vehicle could reach the point without coming in the way of the rally route. Essentially, entire day with me, my car, my radio, couple of bottles of water and some snacks with a responsibility of not moving away from the station as every movement needs to be documented and reported simultaneously. A good test of stamina.

Once all the Radio Marshals settled in their respective Communication points, exchange of signal reports was done to the Rally Base. All communications were 59+ signal quality.

The first car was flagged off in Alpha stage and subsequent flag offs of cars were done. The Radio Marshals noted down the car movement passing their locations. The Rally Base regularly polled every Communication point at regular intervals to get the status of the car which passed by. Reporting was done with at most care and accuracy.
Once the Alpha stage was completed the rally cars entered the Beta stage. Totally 2 rounds of rally were done in each stage, which ended at around 5:30 PM in the evening. The Communication personals then returned to the Service Park after a good day of work in sweltering heat, and exchange of experiences we started back to the hotel for some well earnt rest.

Incidents makes an event more memorable. There was no dearth of it at the point I was stationed. One of it, at some point I was receiving regular call out of car numbers crossing the point before mine while I hardly had any crossing mine. I was asked by the base to check for the possible reason. Since it is strictly not allowed to get to the race track till the round was declared complete/cancelled due to the high level of risk involved with powerful speeding vehicles, I asked one of the press crew sitting a distance away with drone cameras to help with the situation. They sent the drone upstream of the track and figured a blocked rally path. Meanwhile, some of the villagers came up and described the scene. I got the clearance from base by passing the details and went to the point where a race vehicle had a mechanical issue and wedged right across the dirt track. As I kept the communication on, soon help arrived to tow away the broken down vehicle. More time to clear off the jam behind it and move out damaged vehicles to a safe bay right next to my observation point before resuming.

A wonderful and different experience learning more about radio communication setup and making some new friends of radio enthusiasts. Thanks to Dr. Sathyapal, more fondly called as Dr. SP whose energy and passion can be noticed in his meticulous planning and being organized of all the events he organizes.

Credits: Excerpts used from event report compiled by Venkat B (VU3OIM) for IIH.