Kiwi star Hayden Paddon enters the first full day of Rally Estonia with a slender 0.8s advantage after topping this morning’s Super Special Stage.
Paddon, driving BRC Racing’s Hyundai i20 N Rally2 with long-serving co-driver John Kennard by his side, stopped the clock at 1:31.00 on the 1.48 km Tartu Super Special Stage to lead Ireland’s Jon Armstrong by eight-tenths.
European Rally Championship contender Simone Tempestini completed the top three, a further one-tenth adrift.
Mathieu Franceschi, whom Paddon sits alongside tied atop the championship, was 2.5 seconds behind the pace-setting Kiwi in ninth overall.
“In the WRC I was rubbish at all super special stages, if only I knew this 10 years ago,” Paddon quipped following his run.
Rally Estonia returns this afternoon at 4.45 pm (NZST) with the first of nine Special Stages on Saturday, a 21.45 km outing on Raanitsa. An 11.97 km run over Karaski follows before second passes on each of the opening two stages before midday local time.
In the afternoon, a 14.68 km pass on Mäeküla follows a 10.04 km run on Kanepi before both stages are re-run.
A 1.62 km night stage concludes a busy Saturday at 8.00 pm local time.
Four further stages on Sunday conclude the rally at a total of 187.79 km of timed action over three days.
Rally Estonia can be watched with a paid subscription on rally.tv, or followed by live updates from the European Rally Championship.
Header Image: European Rally Championship
