Paddon and Kennard claimed Heat 1 and Heat 2 across Saturday and Sunday in South Australia to take the maximum allotment of 100 points.

Lewis Bates and Anthony McLoughlin trail the leading Hyundai i20 N Rally2 by 85 points.

Bates and McLoughlin are the only pair in mathematical contention for the title after Harry Bates and Coral Taylor suffered a DNF in Heat 1 when they crashed their Toyota GR Yaris Rally2.

After the Adelaide Hills Rally, Harry Bates sits 149 points in arrears of Paddon.

Paddon claimed Heat 1 by 20.7 seconds over Lewis Bates before backing that up in Heat 2 with a winning margin of 31.2 seconds.

“All in all, a pretty good weekend,” said Paddon.

“It’s always about managing things, trying to build a gap in the mornings on the first loop, then manage things like tyres in the afternoons.

“A weekend of management is what I’ve called this one in terms of tyres and strategy, and we did what we needed to do to secure the win.”

After crashing out on Saturday, Harry Bates returned on Sunday to finish fourth in Heat 2.

“Obviously mission accomplished in the respect of winning Heat 1 and extending the championship lead, but it was a real shame that Harry had his little off road excursion.

“It was obviously a close fight, and I think we would have been pushing each other right to the end.

“With Harry on the side of the road, we sort of backed off a bit in the evening just to look after tyres. But in saying that, Louis has not been far away all day as well, so it’s close.”

Despite his enormous lead in the championship, Paddon said he’s not resting on his laurels.

“Being 85 points in front isn’t really a position you like to be in,” he said.

“I’d have preferred to either be closer or have the title wrapped up, because then you can go to Tassie and just push. But now, being in this position, we have to finish seventh or better.

“You’ll probably hear every little rattle and bang in the car all weekend. It makes it a lot more stressful than it probably should be.”

The Australian Rally Championship will conclude with Rally Tasmania on November 7-9.

Toby Price survives scary barrel roll, co-driver hospitalised