MOTORSPORT - At just 20, rally winner has big future ahead

There is an aura of professionalism about Geraldine driver Hayden Paddon that marks him as a man with a big future in the sport.
The young 20-year-old couldn't contain his joy at winning the Hella International Rally of Whangarei yesterday but he still remembered the input of his team and sponsors in his first-ever major rally win.
"I can't believe it, I'm over the moon, it's going to take a wee while to sink in to be honest."
Paddon is the youngest driver to ever win a round of the New Zealand Championship and he did so in only his second year of trying after winning both the Junior Driver and the Rookie of the Year titles last season.
"Our aim was to win a rally by the end of the year and to come here and win the international rally, means we've already exceeded our own goals," he said.
He dedicated his win to his team, Paddon Direct Team Green. "They're awesome guys."
The young driver had a dream run during the two-day event that caused plenty of carnage, although he survived a broken windscreen after hitting a pheasant on stage three on Saturday, and also struck another glitch yesterday.
"Our jack broke with two stages to go and we couldn't change our front tyres but they made it through and that's a testament to the strength and durability of the Michelin tyres."
Paddon beat the favourite Cody Crocker by 24.4sec, but the Australian still took out the maximum points in the Asia Pacific section to once again put him on track to retain his title - in his first rally of the season. Crocker was one of the first drivers to congratulate Paddon.
"It was an awesome win for him, we worked pretty hard this weekend and did a lot of road sweeping ... at some stages I even questioned whether the car was handling all right, it was just that slippery but that was our road position so that's how it goes," the Australian driver said.
Palmerston North's Sam Murray finished in third place overall, 54.9sec behind the winner in his Subaru.
In the Asia Pacific race, Crocker was followed home more than two minutes later by Japanese Subaru driver Hiroshi Yanagisawa, with Indonesian Rifat Sungkar third, a further 6min:42sec back.
In the NZ Championship, Paddon and Murray were followed by Hawke's Bay Mitsubishi driver Stewart Taylor in third place, 3min:13sec behind the winner.
Paddon's win saw him move to the top of the NZ championship table on 102 points, with Murray also jumping ahead of Richard Mason, who led the event after winning the first round in Dunedin.
"That's a hard act to follow for the rest of the season," his proud father and team boss Chris Paddon said. "He was hoping to finish in the top five realistically and he might have thought he could grab a top three but this has exceeded his expectations as well."
* Northlander's car bursts into flames 50m from finishline
Northlander Kirsty Nelson was in the middle of the action in a drama-laden Hella International Rally of Whangarei that saw plenty of withdrawals over the weekend.
Northland's world-class rally roads were responsible for a high attrition rate, with drivers pushing their machines hard, leading to dozens of mechanical failures and more than 30 withdrawals from the field of 79.
The two top Kiwi female competitors in the rally, Dunedin's Emma Gilmour and Nelson, the rising Whangarei star, were forced to retire from the event after spectacular incidents yesterday.
Nelson came up short in the first stage of the day - literally - when her Subaru burst into flames just 50m short of the stage finishline, ending her involvement in her home rally.
Gilmour, the runner-up in the first round of the NZ Rally championship, was pouring on the pace on the Waipu Caves stage yesterday morning, when she left the road and rolled her Subaru WRX down a large drop.
She and co-driver Glen MacNeall were subsequently rushed to hospital.
While the crowds for the event weren't as big as those seen at World Rally Championship races held in Northland in recent years, the locals who got out to watch the Hella International Rally of Whangarei over the weekend certainly got their money's worth.
There was drama aplenty for fans, even if they weren't dwelling on the duel for the title between top-ranked Aussie Cody Crocker and 20-year-old Geraldine upstart Hayden Paddon.