At the presentation function for the recent Stadium Cars Otago International Classic Rally, Hyundai WRC driver, Hayden Paddon, spoke to a packed crowd about winning the Otago Rally, and his life as a WRC driver.

Paddon’s down to earth personality has already made him a crowd favourite around the world, and he looks set to be a WRC star for many years to come.

Leading NZRC driver, Dylan Turner, asked the questions.

Hayden Paddon won the recent Otago Rally in a BDA Escort, even eclipsing the NZRC competitors.Dylan Turner: New Zealanders are incredibly proud of your efforts in the WRC so far, but getting back to the Otago Rally first, what was your favourite stage of the rally?

Hayden Paddon: That’s a no brainer – it’s Kuri Bush for sure. It’s probably one of my favourite stages anywhere in the world, and every international who comes here says it's the closest you can get to Finland without actually being in Finland. It’s probably a little bit hairier going through there in a rear-wheel drive car compared to a four-wheel drive car, because in a four-wheel drive you can fully commit knowing that you have something to get you out of trouble. On this sort of stage it’s obviously pretty easy to get into trouble, and in a BDA if you pick the wrong line you’re gone.

Was getting back into the BDA fun, as it’s got to be totally different to the Hyundai World Rally Car?

Of for sure, I love it. I haven’t driven a jet boat, but I reckon it’s a bit like a jet boat where you stand on it and steer it with the throttle and it’s a lot of fun. Being out of the pressure cooker of the WRC and just coming here to drive is great. I love the pureness of the driving, and it’s why I come here.

You do look pretty relaxed. Are you this relaxed on WRC events, or are you a bit more wound up?

I’m certainly a bit more wound up and there’s a lot more pressure with over 150 people in the team who are putting their eyes on you to perform, so there’s a lot of pressure. There’s also the pressure from the media, but at the end of the day you just have to get in the rally car, put your helmet on and do what you do.

From where you were a few years ago, how much more technical is driving a WRC car? You must study a lot of in-car footage, and have a close relationship with your engineers.

It’s obviously a big job and the team works very hard on the car, and ultimately the team wants to win the Manufacturers’ Championship and that’s what all the drivers, engineers and mechanics are working towards. At that level you’re looking for tenths of seconds, and while there are differences in the cars, it’s not huge. The biggest thing I’ve learnt over the last couple of years is that a lot of it comes down to the driving. Obviously you’re still working on the car set-up a lot, but for us in the WRC the biggest place we’ve got to find time is in our driving. The speed that the guys are going now is absolutely immense, and you’re almost looking for perfection. If you make a mistake on one corner you’ve got no show of getting the time back because your opposition isn’t going to make mistakes very often. The car set-up is very important, but at the moment, we need to be focussing more on our driving.

Paddon-KennardHayden Paddon and John Kennard have formed a formidable combination for Hyundai in the WRC.What are your goals and ambitions for the remainder of this season?

The first goal is to finish a rally, because the last couple haven’t gone so well, so to get some momentum going is the first thing. But we’ve always said that when we get back into rallies in Europe that we know it will be a help. Experience is such a big thing – and Kuri Bush is a prime example. It’s a stage that I’ve done five times and you know how to pick your lines, you know where you can keep it flat, but if you’re doing that stage for the first time you’re going to be a little bit more hesitant, and every time you hesitate it’s half a second lost. It’s exactly the same in the WRC, these guys are driving all the stages absolutely flat out as they know them so well. Portugal is a new rally for everyone so that’s a big help, and then some of the other events coming up we’ve done several times as well. We want to be more regularly in the top five, we want to be beating our team-mates if we can, but obviously they are very fast drivers. In Australia, though, it’s somewhere where we’d like to target to try and get on the podium.

You had offers from Hyundai and Citroen before this season, why did you stick with Hyundai?

It was obviously very humbling to have an offer from Citroen, it wasn’t something we were expecting at all to be honest. If anything it just helped to aide our negotiations with Hyundai, because if that deal didn’t come up we probably would only be doing eight rallies this year, so it came up at the right time and we’re now doing 12 rallies – almost a full championship and it’s a dream come true. We also want to stay as loyal as we can to the brand – a bit like Possum (Bourne) did with Subaru, which is something I always grew up admiring. Obviously we don’t know what the future holds for myself as I have to perform, but it’s a brand that’s got a strong market in this part of the world, they gave us our big break, so of course it’s somewhere we’d like to stay.

Haydon-Paddon-Otago-Rally-2015Paddon hit top form in New Zealand, and is hoping for top placings in the remaining WRC rounds of 2015.What’s your favourite rally in the world?

It’s probably a tie between Whangarei and Otago, but outside New Zealand there’s nothing like Finland. The atmosphere with hundreds of thousands of spectators is just crazy to be a part of, but of course now we need Rally New Zealand back in the WRC, and we’re doing plenty of work in the background to try and make that happen. Competing on your own WRC round in a factory car and going for the win would be something else.

Who was your rallying hero growing up?

Colin McRae was always a huge inspiration to me. I never watched any kids programs when I was a kid, I was always watching repeats of rally videos, and when Colin won the ’95 World Championship I reckon I watched the video 200 times. That’s what gave me the inspiration.

If you could have any rally car in the world, what would be your dream car to drive?

It would be nice to one day get my hands on a ’95 or ’96 Group A Impreza. I love that car with the crackle and the high revving Group A engine. The Group B cars were cool, but it was before my time so I never really grew up watching them.

Are there any stages that you get scared, or nervous about?

Not really, but I must admit that when we did a test in Portugal recently it started raining and the road surface there is soft and sandy and the grip was okay, but when it started pouring with rain it was the least grip that I’ve ever driven on. It was like ice, and you were scared to drive the car, to the point that we came back and said to the team that we need to wait for this rain to stop because there’s no point actually testing. To put it into context, over three kilometres we were 50 seconds slower when it started raining. So if it rains during the Portugal Rally, it could get a bit hairy!

Hayden-HyundaiThe rough stages in Argentina weren't kind to Paddon and his Hyundai i20, but he's targeting a podium finish at Rally Australia.Tell us how rough the stages in Argentina were that destroyed so many cars?

Probably like driving down one of the back streets in Christchurch ……

It’s normally always rough when you go there, but the problem was that the top layer of sand was all washed off, and under that was a whole lot of bedrock, water ruts and holes. It was rough, but we’ve driven sections of stages before that are rougher. The cars can handle it, but the speed in the WRC has gone to such a level, and while I wouldn’t say the cars are any weaker than before, but people are pushing them so much more and in those sort of conditions you have to slow down a bit. But nobody knows how far you have to bring the speed back, and with no split timing in the cars, we were all pushing a bit hard. We didn’t feel like we were going too hard when we broke the car, but obviously it was still too fast.

You have received plenty of support from home in your WRC campaign.

Definitely, I’d like to thank everyone for their support. We get a hell of a lot of support from New Zealand and a lot of messages on social media, and between Katie (his partner) and I, we read them all, so the support does mean a lot when we’re overseas. I can assure you we’re going to be working very hard to make the most of this year and to get the results we’re after.

Photos: Peter Whitten, Hyundai.

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