As a rally driver, Hayden Paddon is used to working in partnership; most obviously with his co-driver, who sits alongside him during all events and is a crucial ingredient of success.
Writing a book requires a new kind of partnership, and Paddon was careful in his selection of a ‘‘ghost writer’’ to bring his story to life. Paddon’s choice, crucial because he wanted to cover some personally challenging ground, was Drivesouth’s Catherine Pattison.
Here they share insights into what it was like to work together on the project that became Driven.
Hayden Paddon
My whole rally journey has been something of a roller-coaster ride, and more often than not when there have been issues or problems, I have had to bite my tongue.
I have always wanted to document it all and my intention, if I ever did so in a book, was to open up on it all, rather than produce something that was basically a catalogue of results and trophies. After all, my life is rallying, and all the personal stuff, no matter how good or bad, ultimately helped shape the person I am today and achieve what we have — it’s a critical part of the story.
However, I am not one to open up, even to family and friends, so this has been a very big deal to me to put quite a lot of my personal stuff on the table. With this in mind, I needed to work with someone I felt comfortable to trust and talk with. I felt it would be easier to speak to someone in person, so a locally based writing partner would be ideal.
And there, just up the road from me in Cromwell, was Hawea-based Catherine Pattison. I knew Catherine from our previous work together. As well as being someone I felt I could talk to about the personal stuff, she understood the sport that has been my life, and not just from writing about it as a journalist, but also through involvement locally as a competitor.
I thought when I raised the possibility of Catherine working with me on the book to such a tight deadline she’d run a mile, but nothing could have been further from the truth; from the first time I put the idea to her, I could see how excited and passionate she was about the project, and the tight timeframe never dented her confidence in the book. Ultimately, I can only write a book once, so I needed my co-author to be someone as passionate about it as me.
Catherine was just that and treated it all so professionally, passionately and quickly.
I think we did maybe eight to 10 interviews and I found once we started talking, the hours would whizz by. It was tough talking about some of the personal, harder moments. As I say, generally I would never talk to anyone about this stuff. But Catherine was a great listener and encouraged me to say what I felt needed to be said. It some ways, those interviews were almost like therapy sessions!
From my side, the process of producing the book was maybe easier — Cat had the huge commitment of transcribing and writing. I’d then give her feedback on what she had written, and we’d discuss where there needed to be changes.
Seeing the end result, with my life documented, is a book we can both be really proud of.
Of course, I am somewhat nervous that people will know a lot about me, including things from my younger days that I am certainly not proud of. But that is part of the purpose too, because as well as illustrating how much work by so many people went into achieving what we have so far, I also want my story to provide some inspiration. After all, I am just a very normal country lad, and if I can achieve my goals, anyone can.
Catherine Pattison
Some of my first correspondence with Hayden about this project was that I’d never written a book but that I’d always wanted to. I just didn’t think my first book would be about the greatest rally driver New Zealand has produced and so have the accompanying pressure that came with it!
I’d long admired Hayden’s determination to become a WRC driver, but only after working on Driven do I truly appreciate how much hard graft by him, his dad, longtime co-driver John Kennard, Team Green and his many, many supporters it took for him achieve his life-long ambition.
In every way it has been a privilege to go beyond the polite veneer of journalist and driver and find out what really went on, out of the public eye, in Hayden Paddon’s inspirational but, at times, phenomenally tough life and career.
Initially, I found it very weird, writing as Hayden rather than about him. Here I am, a 40-year-old mother of two, trying to sound like a 32-year-old male WRC driver!
I felt incredibly apprehensive sending the first chapters to Hayden so he could check that I was on the right track ‘‘being him’’. I can vividly recall the rush of relief when he emailed back this reply: ‘‘Just read through the below and just wanted to say WOW!!! Sounds amazing. You are a natural at this and is a brilliant read — even for me.’’
This reply was the highest praise I could’ve received and gave me the confidence to continue ‘‘channelling Hayden’’.
The toughest part of the project for me was the feedback on my painstakingly crafted first 5000 words from publishers Penguin Random House.
I’d asked them to hit me with all the constructive criticism they had, as I needed to learn quickly; three editors sent through a total of six pages and I was taken back to my early journalism school days, when my proudly presented first attempt at writing a newspaper article came back from the tutors covered in red corrections.
I’ll admit there were a few tears, followed by some crushing self-doubt as to whether I had what it took to pull off a project of this importance and magnitude.
I called Rob Tighe, who wrote Tony Quinn’s book, as he was a fellow journo-turned-first-time book writer and he convinced me it would all turn out OK. His best tip was to treat the book like a series of features, and not be overwhelmed by the magnitude of it all. I heard his words like a mantra in my head from then on: ‘‘Chapter by chapter, Catherine.’’
Those six pages of feedback would become my go-to reference points, as I wrote, and I’d return to them throughout the process.
In hindsight, I can only thank Penguin senior publisher Jeremy Sherlock, managing editor Stu Lipshaw and Driven’s first editor Nicola McCloy for their ‘‘tough love’’. In particular, McCloy’s compassionate job tidying up the first draft and insightful comments and questions set this book on the best possible pathway to becoming a polished finished product. She was effusive in her compliments — claiming to be riveted by the book despite not being a motorsport fan.
A highlight was going for a high-speed ride with Hayden in his Hyundai i20 AP4 rally car a week before the manuscript was due. I was feeling really under the pump by this stage and knew I had MANY more long hours at the computer to go.
This sensory-overloading blat, up a closed gravel road out the back of Hawea, was the ultimate pick-me-up and features in my co-author’s note as it felt like an all-encompassing summary of everything we had been through producing Driven together.
After months of sharing this book project with him, I looked at him in the driver’s seat — helmet on — and understood the true essence of who he is.
‘‘You can see why I love it,’’ he turned to me smiling, as we eased to a halt, dust clouds swirling for kilometres in our wake.
Yes, Hayden, I absolutely can.
- by David Thomson
