Motorsport: Paddon wins place in WRC

Kiwi rally driver Hayden Paddon has won the Pirelli Star Driver Asia Zone award. Photo / Northern Advocate

Geraldine motor rally driver Hayden Paddon will be wearing a big smile all week.

He hasn't won Lotto, but it's as close to the next best thing possible.

Paddon yesterday won the Pirelli Star Driver Asia Zone award, worth an estimated $1 million, by finishing first in the production (Group N) class and ninth overall in the Rally of Australia.

In addition to results on the road relative to the other Pirelli competitors, performance off the track was also evaluated, including personal presentation, media skills and how drivers conducted themselves.

With his polished demeanour, Paddon convinced the judges he was the best candidate in a field of five drivers, to follow in the tracks of fellow New Zealander Mark Tapper who won the inaugural scholarship for the Asian Zone last year.

Paddon's prize is a fully-funded drive in six rounds of next year's world rally championship with a top team along with four other drivers from other zones.

"It has been a full-on week and I had a good sleep last night," Paddon told NZPA from Sydney this morning.

"It's only starting to sink in. It will be a new chapter in my career and I'm looking forward to making the best of it.

"I'll be wearing a grin all week - it's probably like winning Lotto.

"It's pretty special really, a massive prize and a once in a life time opportunity... and it's great to keep the award in Kiwi-land for the second year running."

"It has always been my dream and goal to become a world rally champion and an opportunity like this is the best jump start towards my goal."

The award was contested over nine stages on the first day of the Australian rally on Friday and Paddon dominated proceedings in his Mitsubishi Evo 9.

"We won five of the first eight stages and took away maximum points."

But Paddon was not finished. He still wanted to surpass his previous best world rally championship result in four attempts of 13th overall and fourth in Group N at last year's Rally of New Zealand.

He was second overall in Group N at the start of the second day but put in a huge effort with co-driver John Kennard over the first two stages to move into the lead.

He and co-driver John Kennard had a 13-second lead going into the final day but world junior champion, Martin Semerad of the Czech Republic, cut that to five seconds with five stages to go, forcing Paddon to abandon any thoughts of a conservative drive to the finish.

" We had to lift our game and push right to the very end to the last corner of the last stage which made it pretty exciting."

Paddon's next goal is to win the New Zealand championship.

Going into the sixth and final round at Nelson in two weeks, he simply needs to finish ninth or better on one of the two days of the rally to retain his title.

After that, the work to prepare himself mentally and physically for his tilt on the world stage begins.

- NZPA