Hyundai’s Hayden Paddon led a World Rally Championship event for the first time since Portugal 2018 after emerging from a brutal morning at Rally Paraguay that decimated the Rally1 field.
Paddon and co-driver John Kennard were the only Rally1 crew to avoid trouble across four stages that resulted in Toyota’s Takamoto Katsuta, Hyundai’s Thierry Neuville and reigning world champion Sebastien Ogier retiring from the action.
As a result, Paddon headed to midday service with a surprise 23.9s lead over M-Sport-Ford’s Josh McErlean, while championship leader Elfyn Evans was third, 26.7s from the lead.
“I never expected to lead the rally but obviously a lot of circumstances have played into our hands. It was very tough conditions and it was very hard to find a balance between driving and trying to avoid problems. You have to hold yourself back,” Paddon told Motorsport.com.
Crews had predicted that Rally Paraguay would be all about survival but nobody expected the amount of drama in the form of crashes, tyre issues and mechanical problems that arrived on the red clay gravel stages.
The rally was barely underway when Katsuta misjudged a section of road and rolled his Toyota GR Yaris in the opening stage, ending his day before it had really started.
Katsuta was quickly joined on the retirement list by Hyundai’s Neuville. The 2024 world champion suffered a left-rear puncture in the stage, which developed into a broken suspension. Neuville attempted to fix the issue but was unable to continue.
Thierry Neuville, Martijn Wydaeghe, Hyundai World Rally Team Hyundai i20 N Rally1
Photo by: Hyundai Motorsport
Oliver Solberg set the pace in the opening 24.65km Cambyreta 1 test to move into 3.1s lead over Hyundai’s Adrien Fourmaux with Paddon slotting in third. Ogier had been setting fastest splits until his Toyota suffered a left-rear puncture towards the end of the stage that cost him 24.4s.
Ogier’s woes continued as last year’s winner ran wide and hit a bank in stage two (Nueva Alborada 1) which caused a front-left puncture and damage to the suspension. The nine-time world champion managed to limp through the test but held up Fourmaux in the process. Ogier was unaware of the rapidly catching Fourmaux resulting in the pair making slight front to rear contact. Ogier apologised for holding up Fourmaux but that was the least of his worries as five minutes were dropped. A temporary repair was completed on the suspension arm but Ogier ultimately retired on stage three (Yerbateras 1).
“Honestly I’m a bit lost for words. It is definitely not the standard for a world championship [referring to the tyres],” Ogier told Motorsport.com. “It is just a lottery all the time. It is far from acceptable. I tried to stay calm but we had a number of issues with this puncture happening in stage one on jump landing on a straight. I completely do not understand.
“Then at the end of the stage my steering had an issue and I couldn’t activate the boost but luckily we had a recovery mode and we could activate that.
“It was switching on and off with the boost at the start of the stage and I just came over a crest too fast and I hit a bank and damaged the front-left suspension. I knew it would be difficult to come back.”
Solberg claimed victory in stage two and extended his lead to 7.1s over Paddon, while Fourmaux dropped to third after being held up by Ogier.
Sebastien Ogier, Toyota Gazoo Racing WRT Toyota GR Yaris Rally1
Photo by: Toyota Racing
However, it was Solberg who was next to hit trouble. The Swede suddenly lost engine power approaching a corner and went into a ditch, which required spectators to bump start the car, costing valuable time. To make matters worse he then had to stop to change a right-rear puncture, losing more than four minutes altogether.
“Luckily the fans got me going again but after that I was just trying to be clean to the finish but then I got a slow puncture in straight-line and lost another two minutes, we lost a lot of time but it was pure bad luck and we have to move forward. There is a long way to go but punctures for others and we are back in it,” said Solberg.
Solberg’s drama handed Paddon the lead as the New Zealander won stage three after Fourmaux was forced to stop and change a punctured front left tyre, which demoted the Hyundai driver to sixth overall, behind leading WRC2 runner and local hero Diego Dominguez.
Evans and the M-Sport duo of McErlean and Jon Armstrong also suffered from delaminating tyres. Armstrong’s moment proved the costliest as he also lost the front-right brake caliper and suffered a high-speed spin. Armstrong was able to make it back to service without brakes in seventh overall.
McErlean’s almost clean run through morning stages was rewarded with second overall, 2.8s ahead of Evans, while Toyota’s Sami Pajari held fourth after losing time to a water leak.
The crews will repeat the loop of stages this afternoon.
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– The Autosport.com Team
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