Hayden Paddon fears he will have to resort to driving his older New Zealand-based car for this year’s Rally New Zealand due to the massive rise in global transport costs.
The 35-year-old Kiwi had to withdraw from this weekend’s Rally Estonia after five stages following a positive Covid-19 test, as his incredible WRC bad luck continues.
If all goes well, he will be at Rally Finland next month and after that he will be one of the star attractions at this year’s Rally NZ, which starts on September 29.
However, Paddon is concerned that he may not be able to drive such a competitive car at Rally NZ, which would put a damper on not only his rally but the event in general.
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Paddon briefly took part in his new Hyundai i20 N Rally2 this weekend, the car he plans to use next year when he fully participates in WRC2.
Joshua William Photography
Hayden Paddon may have to use his older Hyundai i20 AP4 rally car at the WRC Rally NZ later this year.
The plan was to bring this car back to New Zealand after next month’s Rally Finland to do more work on it and drive it at the WRC event in Auckland.
However, Paddon says that because shipping costs have skyrocketed, driven by a number of factors, including a large rise in fuel prices and the war in Ukraine, Paddon says he may not be able to afford to return it.
“Obviously we want to bring it to New Zealand at some point and we need to do a lot of development work on it at home before we come back to Europe,” Paddon said.
“The idea is that we can get it back home as soon as possible.”
However, shipping costs have tripled in the last 12 months and given the limited budget Paddon is working on, he may have to keep the car in Europe.
“That’s the dilemma right now, if we can get the car home for Rally NZ,” he said.
“In a normal world we would, but right now freight costs are through the roof and that makes it more difficult.”
Jack Smith/Hyundai New Zealand Rally
Hayden Paddon had hoped to get a WRC1 car for Rally New Zealand, but Hyundai has been unable to deliver one for him.
If Paddon cannot use the i20 N Rally2 at Rally New Zealand, he says he will have to use his older Hyundai AP4, which he first used in 2016.
“That’s the only other option we have, so it’s not that easy,” said Paddon.
“We are currently working on it every day. Initially we would have liked to be in a WRC1 car, but that is not possible, so now we are working on a WRC2 car and there are a few logistical challenges there at the moment.
“So we’ll keep working on that, but the AP4 is at home, ready to rally, so we can make the decision quite late.” The perfect scenario for Rally NZ would have been for Hyundai to take with them a WRC1 works car for Paddon to use, which their drivers Ott Tänak and Thierry Neuville will use in New Zealand.
In an i20 N Rally1, Paddon really could have competed with the best in the world. However, one of those cars was not available.
“We are clearly committed to the Hyundai brand,” Paddon said.
“We spoke to Hyundai to see if a car could come, but the global shortage of parts, supply and material made it impossible to get a car.”
In 2019, he was given a seat at a few events, in Finland, UK and Australia, with M-Sport in a Ford Fiesta, which he hoped would help him return to a full-time factory team seat at the time. .
However, he crashed during testing in Finland and was unable to participate in the rally.
At Rally GB he spun and stranded his car on the first day and on the second he got two flat tires forcing him to stop again for the day.
Then the Australian event was canceled due to the bushfires that ravaged New South Wales at the time.
While it’s one thing for Paddon to drive a Ford abroad, it’s quite another to do so during Rally NZ, where he will have the eyes of the whole country on him.
“Hyundai New Zealand has been very good to me, so it’s a two-way street,” he said.
At Rally Estonia, Paddon struggled with his i20 N Rally2, but that’s mainly because he and his team are still fine-tuning the car.
He didn’t expect a great result this weekend and that will be the case for next month’s Rally Finland, but the aim of this European journey is to start in 2023, when he will participate fully in WRC2.
“This year is all about putting the building blocks in place,” he said.
“We don’t have a budget to test this year, that’s our biggest problem. We changed the car, but we didn’t test, which is very unusual.
“There are a lot of reasons for that and one of them is that we don’t have the budget for it.
“Hopefully this weekend is about taking a step forward with the car and then doing the same for Finland, but of course we want to let the competition side progress, we don’t want to go after things because we only have one car and a small budget .”