The Tapaswi Racing Story

Some legacies are written in ink.
Ours was written in dust, fuel, and the echo of a gate drop.

1988. Pune. A foreign Supercross round thundered through India; the Tapaswi family was already in the arena — bikes being tuned in the yard, a father pointing a rally car toward Himalayan passes. For us, motorsport wasn’t a pastime. It was inheritance.

When Indian motorsport fell silent, Tapaswi Racing refused to lift off.
While events dried up and politics slowed progress, TR kept the culture alive. In 2014, the first Underground meet was held — 17 cars, invite-only, no tickets, no spectators. Just machines and purists. That night, India’s car culture found its pulse again.

From there, the line kept climbing. We revived icons like the Zen, Baleno, and Gypsy — not as nostalgia, but as living proof of what made Indian motorsport. We created what didn’t exist: India’s first Super Moto race, the nation’s first serious drift school, a network of curated Underground meets that grew from 17 cars to hundreds. Dates undisclosed. Venues rotating. Always permitted. Always controlled. Always earned.

We learned the hard way what “competition” means: a drag car sabotaged out of state, a flatbed ride home, a vow to build a community that protects its own. That vow became our backbone: if you share the ethic, you’re in. If not, there are other places to be.

And then came the breakthroughs. We trained in Thailand, burned through donor cars, and built sideways into a discipline. Manual rear-drive Mercedes C-Class machines became the workhorses of our drift program. We built Off Duty Driver, one of India’s earliest drift schools, exporting cars and know-how to Kerala, Chandigarh, and Delhi. Real seat time. Real training. Real culture.

Underground grew the only way we allowed: organically. By the ninth edition, curated fleets from across the country stood shoulder to shoulder — basement builds, rally specials, factory icons, and drift weapons. Still invite-only. Still family at heart.