Hayden Paddon has a new co-driver.
This time, it’s for his business.

Paddon has been vocal about wanting to build a NZ rally team that competes internationally and to support that vision he wants to turn Paddon Racing Group from a Cromwell workshop and rally team into a technology-led motorsport business serving Asia-Pacific and, eventually, South America. To help him think beyond the next event or racing season, he has brought in a business co-driver: Chris Hughes, co-founder of Duality.

Paddon’s racing career and business have grown together. That means that when he competes in New Zealand, he is both the athlete and the business owner on the day–responsible for his own performance while Paddon Racing Group supports the cars, clients and operations around him.

At the Ashley Forest Rallysprint on 20 September, Paddon set a new course record while Paddon Racing Group ran six cars across the event.

The objective is not to take Paddon out of the driver’s seat. It is to determine what the business needs to carry without depending on his constant availability, so he can concentrate on competing harder, faster and for longer while the business continues growing alongside him.

“The problem is that – when you’re time poor, it’s hard to get around to doing this stuff as well,” Paddon said. Paddon has begun monthly Co-Driver sessions with Hughes to step back from the immediate demands of racing and operations, test the different routes available and work through what needs to happen – and in what order – to bring the larger ambition into reality.

Hughes spent 25 years driving, scaling and leading within his family business, helping Switched On Group grow from $30 million to $300 million before exiting. Through Duality, he now works alongside owners taking their businesses somewhere they have not been before.

Paddon and Hughes have known each other since competing in the early 2000s, and Paddon Racing Group has serviced Hughes’s rally cars for years. Paddon is Duality’s first Co-Driver ambassador and will share monthly updates as the work progresses.

Hayden Paddon and Paddon Racing Group

Paddon Racing Group is a rally team, workshop and engineering operation based in Cromwell, New Zealand. Hayden Paddon won the Australian Rally Championship in 2025 and returned to the World Rally Championship's top tier with Hyundai Motorsport in 2026.

Duality

Duality helps good businesses carry forward through the moments that put real pressure on a business and the people carrying it, bringing together the capability, capacity and capital required for what comes next. Duality Co-Driver puts an experienced operator in the seat beside a leader, month to month, when they’re taking the business somewhere they haven’t been before.

For more information contact:

Chris Hughes, Duality, chris@teamduality.co.nz, 027 662 8097

Hayden Paddon, Paddon Racing Group, hayden@paddongroup.co.nz, 027 318 1748