The dust has now settled on our Friday accident here at Rally Finland and already our focus has turned to the upcoming rallies, Germany and Australia.
Hayden Paddon was in the top 5 until an accident on Day 1.While it's disappointing to not get the result we were wanting, we are still upbeat with the speed we showed - being in the top 5 on all the stages and ahead of our teammates. Of course there is still a lot more to come, as we were caught out a little here with the conditions and the lack of grip, which we were not expecting.
Prior to the event there had been a lot of rain. Normally you would expect this to make the roads here soft and/or muddy. But because of the amount of daily traffic these roads see, the roads had become very hard and compact (almost like tarmac in places) and most of the gravel washed off.
What this meant is that our tyres had nothing to bite into to get the grip - and instead skid on the top. We have never driven or tested in low grip conditions like this, so on Friday morning we were making suspension changes between each stage to try and improve.
With the drier afternoon loop, extra grip and some improvements to the car, it was feeling good - which our splits also showed. Unfortunately, 1km from the end of one of my favourite stages of the rally I made a small mistake.
On a fast right, left combination, I cut the right hander about 1cm too much where we hit a hidden rock that I did not see. The impact broke the steering and immediately we were passengers as we went into the trees on the outside of the left hander at 150km/h.
The roll itself did not seem so bad, but the first impact extensively damaged the right front corner. Despite the team’s best efforts, the damage was too bad to repair to rejoin the rally.
Here in Finland the smallest of errors have big consequences, but as I say we are still upbeat and full of confidence for the future events. This is all part of the learning process and luckily (touch wood) we don't do it too often. Both John and I are absolutely fine other than being a little stiff, but is testament to how strong the Hyundai i20 WRC is.
We have stayed on here in Finland to support the team, but also spent most of yesterday going through data with my engineer to start planning for our next gravel rally - Australia. We have also started planning towards our tarmac test next week and Rally Germany soon after.
Tarmac is a surface we are not so familiar or comfortable with, so Germany will be a matter of taking a step back, being patient and learning stage by stage.
It has been great also seeing so many fans and Kiwis here. I do apologise you were not able to see us more on the stages, but still hope you enjoyed the weekend.
Until Germany,
Hayden.
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