Hayden Paddon

[dimviii]

yes if he could pay, he could drive with new car.

[janvanvurpa]

Had it happened to Ogier last year (who ofcourse would not have tested with his race car on Monday), the plane carrying a new Fiesta would have landed in Helsinki on Tuesday. But air freight is incredibly expensive, so it's understandable that the same option isn't there for Paddon.

Maybe he could start a G0-Fund-Me campaign???

[steve.mandzij]

Maybe he could start a G0-Fund-Me campaign???

I bet he wouldn't make enough for an R1 Fiesta with that.

[mknight]

There was a crowdfunding campaign for R. Kresta at the end of 2004/start of 2005 to buy him a seat for Monte Carlo. In the end he got sponsors that paid the whole year at MSport.

[janvanvurpa]

I bet he wouldn't make enough for an R1 Fiesta with that.

I was of course being sarcastic and mainly poking fun at the number of wannabe beginner rally-fools in the US who want to parly their driving their Subarus (always Blue) in a grassy field 3 times into a "career" at "professional rally racing"...

I like Paddon and his enthusiasm and loyalty to his NZ sponsors and supporters and its just a damn shame that the entire sport has become such a "high-finance" dependent sport so much like other types of car racing..Budget budget budget...
Such a s shame....

[Tarmop]

His comments are more positive every day. Perhaps there is hope, even this season.

[mknight]

His comments are more positive every day. Perhaps there is hope, even this season.

Money is one thing... opportunity another.

If he shows up in Australia all seats might already be taken, probably even by GB time. So Turkey might be the only chance.

[Rally Power]

I like Paddon and his enthusiasm and loyalty to his NZ sponsors and supporters and its just a damn shame that the entire sport has become such a "high-finance" dependent sport so much like other types of car racing..Budget budget budget...
Such a s shame....

Yep, it's a shame but Paddon situation didn't started with a budget issue; it started with a weird choice from Hyundai management. With Paddon available and used to the car and the team why have they chosen to bring a new driver, which probably will spend the entire event trying to get used to a new car? Hard to figure out...

[GravelBen]

The point is if he paid more, either upfront or after the crash, would he get a new car? I think so.

No, he and M-Sport said in interviews afterwards that the reason for doing the test in his event car was because the deal to drive came together quite late to plan for the rally, and they just didn't have another car ready/available for testing or as a replacement. Time was the limitation in this case not money.

M-Sport said that even if they did have another car at the workshop ready to go it would take 3.5 days for them to get it there and it wouldn't arrive in time. Millener sounded almost as frustrated as Paddon that they couldn't repair or replace the car in time for the rally.

[GravelBen]

Money is one thing... opportunity another.

If he shows up in Australia all seats might already be taken, probably even by GB time. So Turkey might be the only chance.

I don't know, you're talking like he is some new driver who has to do a rally to prove his speed but that isn't the case. They already know he is fast.

While a good result in Finland obviously would have helped his status, even with the testing accident he has put the message out there that he is on the market and available to drive for anyone now, not just on-call for Hyundai like he was before.