Paddon Update: Germany was educational!

Hayden Paddon writes after Rally Germany…..

We have reached the end of Rally Germany in 9th place after a trying but educational 3 days of rallying. In one sense we achieved our pre-event goal of finishing in the points, but there is the other side of me that can never be satisfied with 9th. Nevertheless the tarmac was always going to be a big challenge and this gives us a good platform to build on for the upcoming tarmac events.

The week started off well, fastest Hyundai in shakedown, and within 1 second on the first stage on Friday morning. Right from the get go this properly raised my expectations for the weekend. The rest of Friday went well, and by the end of the day we were still within 20 seconds of both Thierry and Dani. Considering this is a rally that they have finished 1-2 on in both 2013 and 2014, this was a lot closer than we expected. However the closeness of the field meant that we were still in 8th.

Looking for improvements with my driving on Day 2, we were hampered by much of the day by a turbo problem – which meant we lacked a lot of power. On some stages we were able to limit the damage, but on the longest stage of the rally, Panzaplatte, we were a sitting duck. With 100’s of junctions and accelerations, it really hurt us. Throughout the day we lost the best part of a minute of a half, but importantly still got through the stages and learnt more.

Today was about protecting our 9th position and gaining more experience. Despite studying data and onboard footage each night, it seemed difficult to put those theories into practice in the heat of the moment. So despite trying today, we didn’t see the improvement I was looking for. We did have some good splits, but we also had some bad splits. This combined does give me a lot of information and things to work on when studying this event when it comes to Rally Corsica preparation (our next tarmac event).

Now the focus has turned to Rally Australia – the event I have been looking forward to all year. This will be our best chance this year for a good result, and this weekend has made me even more fired up to try and achieve that. So a lot of work and preparation to do over the next 2 weeks to make sure we are best prepared as ever. We head back NZ on Tuesday for 10 days for some PR events before then heading to Rally Australia.

A huge thanks to the team this weekend who had a good result, 2 cars in the top 5, all 4 cars finishing and claiming back 2nd in the manufacturers championship. Is a big thanks to our gravel note crew, Piero Liatti and Fabrizia Pons. To have 2 legends of the sport who I grew up watching in the WRC helping us is really humbling. Its also amazing to see no matter where we go in the world, the number of Kiwis that seemingly come out of no where – thanks for all your support.

Thanks for your support – bring on Rally Australia

Hayden