Video Vednesday: Who the fuck is Sarath Kumar?

You’ve heard the name before, haven’t you? So have I. In fact, I wrote an article about him when he scored a podium at the Asia Dream Cup. But what do I really know about Sarath Kumar? Apart from he being an Indian and a motorcycle racer, not much. I can guarantee you don’t either.

Shankar Sarath Kumar, 23, is a professional motorcycle racer from Chennai. He started his career way back in 2008, racing a TVS Apache at the JK Junior Championship and the Summer Cup, finishing second in both. He then went on to become a National Champion in the 130cc 4-stroke Novice class in the same year, followed by being a National Champion in the 165cc Expert class in 2010. 

In 2011 he hit the big league, participating in the 125cc class of MotoGP with support from the WTR-Ten10 Racing team. That excursion didn’t really go that well, as he was able to ride his bike at only 3 circuits, out of which at 2 he didn’t qualify, and finished 24th in the third.

So now that you have a slight idea of what Sarath has achieved, here is a 3-year-old video of him talking to some chick in a short red dress.

Insane, isn’t it? A random dude from such humble origins has such an incredible talent with 2 wheels, and even though the great nation of India is trying its best to crush his dream, he’s not giving up.

There are so many people in India, young and old, who have done brilliant things on motorcycles. It doesn’t matter where they came from, doesn’t matter where they went, what matters is that they did what they wanted to know, without giving a shit about others. These are the people I want to connect to, the people I want on RiderZone, the people I want you to know.

I’m reminded of Anton Ego’s words from Ratatouille:

Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere.