Chennai, Feb 27 (IANS): The second round of the MMSC-FMSCI National Racing Championship, headlined by the MRF Formula 1600, will be held here this weekend with prospects of close battles at the top.

Goutham Parekh leads the MRF Championship after winning Race 1 and finishing second in Race 2 last month. He is closely followed by 2014 Indian Touring Car champion Arjun Narendran, who is just six points behind while 2014 Volkswagen Polo R Cup winner Karthik Tharani Singh is 13 points adrift of the leaders.

In the National Championship, the Formula LGB 1300 will make its bow after missing the first round in January with nine drivers in the fray and three races scheduled.

Also on the cards are the popular saloon car categories of Indian Junior Touring Cars (IJTC), Indian Touring Cars (ITC) and Super Stock that have never failed to dish out close, and at times, aggressive racing as was the case in the previous round.

Leading the ITC class is Arjun, who won both races last month, while Fahad Kutty and B. Siddharth are tied on 40 points in IJTC, and Varun Narekar and Abhinay Bikani are locked with 43 apiece in Super Stock.