After they won Heat 1 on Saturday, they took their Hyundai i20N Rally 2 to win Heat 2 which included the extra points Power Stage. While not totally comfortable in the tricky and slippery conditions early, Paddon was much more comfortable with conditions were more consistent.
Overnight rain made conditions slippery, particularly in the morning’s three stages, before the they were repeated in the afternoon.
Paddon and Kennard finished the six stages and 82 competitive kilometres 5.4 seconds ahead of reigning Australian champions Harry Bates and Coral Taylor in their Toyota GR Yaris Rally 2. Third and just 1.3s adrift were the Swedish pair of Tom Kristensson and Andreas Johansson who campaigned Scott Pedder’s Skoda Fabia R5.
Kristensson and the points leaders before the round, Lewis Bates and Anthony McLoughlin (Yaris Rally 2) finished equal third after the latter placed fourth to hold onto the points lead, albeit by a reduced margin.
In similar fashion to Heat 1, Kristensson came out of the blocks fast with the first stage (SS7) victory. It was tight as he was only 0.7s in front of Pedder and Graeme Macneall (Skoda Fabia RS Rally 2).
Pedder took the lead with a dominant SS8 victory which propelled them to a 9.3s lead over the Swedes. However, it all came unstuck on SS9 when the Skoda slipped off the road and ended up on its side.
“It was the most diabolical slippery corner I have ever seen,” Pedder said. “We were passengers for 50 metres and missed a couple of trees.” Damage was restricted to the rear spoiler and some dents, but they were stuck until brought in to the service park afterwards.
Paddon began more conservatively and was fifth after SS7 and fourth after SS8. That became third by the end of SS9 as Harry Bates won the stage. After the service break, they squared SS10 with equal times before Paddon edged Bates by 1.2s on the penultimate stage and blitzed everyone on the Power Stage by 5.4s.
Alex Rullo and Steve Glenney (Hyundai) finished Heat 2 fifth in from of Clayton Hoy/Erin Kelly (Mitsubishi EVO 6), Peter Rullo/Ben Searcy (Hyundai), Troy Dowel/Mitch Garrad (Yaris), Dylan King/Lee Tierney (Yaris), and Tim Hiles/Noah Humble (Subaru Legacy).
Outside the top 10 were Craig Rando/Scott Beckwith (Yaris), Thomas Loughton/Michael Lloyd (Evo X), Glenn Alcorn/Jonathan Charlesson (Toyota AE86) and Toby Price/Holly Kilbride (Subaru Impreza WRX).
The next round of the ARC will be Rally Queensland based at Gympie on July 4-6.
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