Achtung! That's a Bobby trap
The Car Cult sits with Pratap 'Bobby' Jayaram, a keen car enthusiast who might have made a handful of cars in his career. With his perennially welcoming personality, he'll make you believe that you're probably as talented or knowledgeable as him. He won't say anything, playing along nicely until you challenge him into a metaphorical fist fight. Because that's when everything changes. I call this phenomenon the Bobby trap, in which he’ll make you walk into a conversation where you might flaunt about something cool and then quite nonchalantly, Bobby will not just one-up you, he'll make you understand why you ought to not mess with someone who has been responsible for creating 403 (and counting) extraordinary machines. Like what? The ahead-of-its-time G-Wiz is one and so is the Baleno racecar which has enough power to influence the next elections. Bobby for Prez? Quite possibly!
Pratap Jayaram - The Early Days
The story starts with a young Pratap Jayaram trying to find his feet in the world of karting. Motorsport was a familiar affair for him, with Mr A D Jayaram, Bobby's father, being a racer himself, and the rest of the extended clan was also involved in setting the track alight with their performance. What Bobby possessed, at the tender age of 5 wasn't just the ability to drive a kart competitively, but a terrific weight advantage, too. He won and won. This was the early 1960s and for Bobby, there has been no rear-view mirror ever since.
Of course he can turn back to relish his greatest moments as a racer, a car builder, a friend of some of the most prominent names in the Indian racing world, and as the man who gave India electric wheels way before the market was made to realise that it could essentially be the future...
A few years later, Bobby's shenanigans reached new heights. By seven, he says, he had acquired the skill to properly drive a car. Which meant regularly sneaking out for a joyride, without letting Mr and Mrs Jayaram have the slightest idea of the family saloon's increased mileage. His friends from around the block and him would mark the tyres' position on the porch to park it back exactly where the car originally was. Smart!
That was of course until our man was caught red-handed, driving around the Standard Super 10 proudly, completely oblivious to the presence of his family’s Triumph 1360 right behind him. A 'good shelling' ensued.
As he grew older, it was also made clear to Bobby that until he finished his engineering degree, there just wouldn’t be any professional racing happening for him. So, of course, defying logic and pretty much the only — and fairly reasonable — constraint he was presented with, Bobby, on the insistence of Kari, took the Jayaram Special out for a test run around Nandi Hills one day. This turned out to be a great exercise because on the race day, he ended up setting a new record for the hillclimb, breaking the existing record by some nine seconds. The morning after, a few minutes before what would turn into a royal bollocking by A D Jayaram, who unbeknownst of his son's legendary run, saw a familiar name in the local papers along with the headline 'Young Pratap Jayaram sets a new record on the hill'...
'Congratulations, fantastic job', said the proud racer-dad to his son, although maintaining that he would still need to finish that degree before taking up racing. "This was in 1974... '75, which is when I broke the record, and that record is with me even today. 49 years later, no one has come close. The only person who's beaten my record has been me only — in different cars. That was 1:34-something, and today, I'm at 1:22."
In a turbocharged Sipani Dolphin.
The Jayarams were also no stranger to running Group-2 Heralds, and when Bobby showed interest in building one, it didn't take too long for his wish to be granted. Typical of him, he worked and worked, perfected the car in more ways that seemed possible, making it quicker than the rest of the pack by maximising innovation. This resulted to be a massacre on the racetrack — beating more powerful cars left, right, and centre.
'My car, I went all out. This was 1060 cc, the Fiat class was 1200. And there were times when I beat their lap time by almost a second and half. This was basically a Formula car rear suspension fitted into a Herald. It was running an LSD, too.'
From 1978 or so onwards, Bobby started racing full-time, driving various cars across a variety of classes, on the track, in rallies... You name it. It was always the number 36 reserved for him; and if it was a complete build by himself, it would most definitely be liveried in a very John Player-esque combination of black and gold. Not just is the colour scheme his favourite, Bobby maintains how JPS is an anagram for Pratap Jayaram Special. Fair point.
After years of racing highly competitively, Bobby didn't turn towards the track between 1995 and 2010. It was when a fellow racer claimed that it would take him at least five years to catch up and be anywhere near the podium that Bobby decided to make a comeback. Which is unsurprising, because by now you must've realised that Pratap Jayaram loves challenges.
'If I bring a car, I guarantee I'll be there next to you...'
The race wasn't devoid of challenges, either.
'I qualified last; last on the grid. The race starts.'
'Come C3; I'm the first car.'
That is overtaking the entire grid in a total of two corners. Wonder what mental car this was? A race-spec Baleno saloon, which saw Mantra Racing pour an unprecedented amount of roughly £60k to prep — roughly 15 years ago!
How does 200+ bhp from a naturally aspirated 1.6 Baleno sound to you? At what rpm? '11,000.'
Away from the track, Bobby found himself to be offering his engineering know-how to various projects across the Atlantic to owning a Mitsubishi 3000GT that he was caught doing insane speeds in. Of course, the coppers couldn't resist asking more about the car, and I'm sure it was the encyclopaedic chatter by Bobby that helped him find a way out of getting even a slap on the wrist.
Back home, he developed what was India's first commercially available modern electric car, the Maini Reva, or how folks in the UK would remember, the G-Wiz. If that wasn't enough, Bobby somehow turned the Reva bossman's father's Ford Taunus into an electric-powered classic. It got recognition from Taunus clubs globally. He continued to consult with many other carmakers including the likes of Mahindra (who later took over from Maini) and Tata (which happens to be the leading EV maker in India).
But they are everyday cars and you'd expect more insane from him, right? Well, he loves to please his fans! Bobby's pet projects continue to amaze and alarm people in equal measure. His drag-spec motorcycles amass championships quicker than you can imagine, and it’s safe to say that drag runs are still pretty much Mantra Racing territory (despite the arrival of some highly talented car and bike builders), and when it comes to extremely insane forms of motoring, it's almost a given that all roads lead to Frazer Town in Bangalore (which is where Bobby resides).
A G-Wiz that's powered by a Hayabusa might sound like something up Colin Furze's street, and with 600+ bhp, it's borderline insane to justify its existence let alone having the pair to build or drive one. My ex-colleague (and possibly the best motorcycle writer in the country) Kartik Ware did a brilliant piece on the Revabusa; its link is added at the end of this story.
According to Bobby, driving the ‘Busa-engined Reva is pretty straightforward. 'Shift 1... 2... 3... 4, 5, 6... and then you'll see the God on the windscreen, stand on the brakes and 6, 5, 4, 3, 2, 1...'
*erupts into laughter*
He continues, 'the skill of putting that power down is something different; I don't want electronics,' but he accepts that as things gets faster, they'll need to bring in some electronic nannies. Want to prove him wrong? Please be my guest.
In addition to this, there's a lot that Bobby and his son Sharan have grown great expertise in: from making race-winning machines to honing your street build to punch well above its weight, they've covered it all. From what I see, hear, and am allowed to talk about, there's a lot of exciting stuff that happens at Mantra Racing, but it's equally hard not to make another mention of the race-spec Baleno. In the metal, it looks insanely cool. Despite not having raced in a while, the car seems ready to take over the next competition it enters. It didn't just become a rather excellent way of Bobby's comeback to the track fifteen years ago but also showed some new-age tuners their place. Plus what a fitting way to prove that the old man's still got it in him...
But age isn't even a number, it's just a phenomenon called Bobby trap. He'll coerce you into believing that he doesn't stand a chance, but only until the lights turn green.
While this is just a brief introduction to who Bobby is and you'll get to read more about his creations and racing exploits as we chronicle more stories, the feature can't be complete without the mention of a car that can only be described as otherworldly. It's his dad's beloved creation, the Jayaram GT.
"Dad's dream car. At that point in time, he couldn't afford a Ferrari or a Jag, so he said he would build one that’s better than those. He started off with a 1:8 clay model, and then we began doing perspex windows etc., on the model itself.'
There was no CAD so they drew full-sized panels on sheets on the floor. This was followed by metal forming to check for tolerances. Pretty much like how Bobby would build his racing Herald after college every day, this was done similarly after both Jayarams returned from work. It took them nearly four and a half years to finish.
'The door cutline (shut-line) in normal cars is about 10 mm, on this, it is 2 mm, precisely.'
Painting is another area where they continued with a penchant for accuracies that's not usually seen. The car used to be painted and then they would check the body line. Jayaram Senior would take a piano wire and place it a foot away from the car. Lit from the other end, they would notice the reflection of the wire on the car.
“The reflection had to be perfect. if there was a wave, then you knew the body wasn't clean. In that case it would be scraped again, re-tapped, finished, and painted. Once we got it right finally, the car received its SEVENTEEN coats of paint. What you see on the car today is original; I don’t have the balls to touch it.”
Everything on the car was built at home, including the paint mix. The only thing they imported, adds Bobby, was the India monogram. From England, no less. And then there are fun elements on the car. The windscreen washers, for instance, are two lads taking a wee. A wax mould of the figurine was made and then turned into a cast.
Powering the car is a Herald-sourced engine only it’s highly modified. Bored to 1.4-something litres, the engine is connected to an eight-speed gearbox. What?! Yes, gasp, you must, because this was still the 70s, and there's no way you expected that, did you? It's a cleverly designed setup, with four intermediate gears which are operated using a switch, offering a mix between a standard gearbox and a close-ratio unit.
Would you believe this hand-tapped, engineered at home car also made it to the Milan Auto Show? 'People were flabbergasted.'
The other absolutely ace of a car was the spaceframe Jayaram Special, which was built alongside the GT and had a great life, even towards the end of its tenure with Bobby at the helm, driving it at ten-tenths on hill-climb runs. It’s going to be a feature in itself, and hopefully we’ll learn more about it the next time speak to Bobby. There’s of course a lot to chat about including the aforementioned G-Wiz that makes upwards of 600 bhp…
Yeah, dear reader, you might want to pick your jaw up now. Cheers!
You must also check out Kartik’s story on the Revabusa (https://motoringworld.in/car-features/mantra-racing-hayabusa-powered-reva-g-wiz-revabusa/) and the multiple-award-winning writer Vaishali Dinakaran’s original piece on the Jayaram GT ( https://web.archive.org/web/20160819140247/https://www.bsmotoring.com/news/one-of-a-kind-the-jayaram-gt/2181)