For nearly a year, Republican Assembly Member Greg Ball has been crisscrossing the Hudson Valley in his effort to unseat incumbent Rep. John Hall. He has raised money, assembled a staff, and met with GOP operatives in Washingon.

But the sudden entrance into the race of Nan Hayworth, a wealthy ophthalmologist from Mount Kisco, has upended Ball’s trajectory.

Hayworth has never run for office, but has raised more than $300,000 and has hired a veteran campaign team.

“She already had significant momentum, not just with people in the district, but with people in Washington, people willing to give money,” said Tory Mazzola of the National Republican Campaign Committee, which does not take sides in primaries.

But in an era where hard-right conservatives seem to be having a resurgence, Hayworth could become a target of the movement. She is pro-choice and her OB-GYN husband has himself performed abortions.

But even as she runs against the outspoken, hard-line Ball next year, those who support her say it would be foolish to underestimate her ability to win.

Hayworth, 49, graduated at the top of her class from Princeton, then Cornell, and received numerous awards for her medical practice. She has carried out several public service jobs on the side of her private practice, attracting the attention of Senate Minority Leader Dean Skelos for a position at the Hudson River Park Advisory Council and doing volunteer work for the state health department.

For the congressional race, Hayworth has also won the support of Sue Kelly, the former seven-term Congresswoman who was defeated by Hall in 2006.

“She’s a lot smarter than I am,” said Kelly, who first met Hayworth years ago when working with her husband.

NRCC representatives referred to Hayworth as a Kelly recruit, but both women say Hayworth called Kelly out of the blue a few months ago to pitch her plan to run. Kelly gave her enthusiastic blessing.

Observers note that Kelly showed that the district looks for a centrist, which may benefit Hayworth, who said her views largely lined up with Kelly’s—though she shied away from calling herself a moderate. A strong fiscal conservative, she decided to run because she sees an opening in the district’s resentment over taxes and White House spending—and because she is angered by the same things.

Hayworth has put $150,000 of her own money into her campaign already, and raised almost as much as Ball on top of that. (Both still have less than Hall.)

Most local politicos have written her off as a neophyte, regardless of the money. Two out of five local GOP county chairs said they would be supporting Ball, while the remaining three could not be reached for comment.

“She’s a nice lady, but she brings nothing to the table,” said Anthony Scannapieca of Putnam County. “They’ve got lots of money, but you need more than money to run a race.”

“I think she should be looking at a State Senate seat, a State Assembly seat,” said Vincent Reda of Rockland County. “I think she should start out at a lesser position and work her way up.”

The two candidates promise to be an odd couple on the primary trail. Ball, at 32, is an attention-grabbing campaigner who unseated a seven-term incumbent in 2005. He has made a career of scolding Albany for its dysfunction, and has been a player in a number of bizarre incidents, from a dead goat left at his doorstep to a temporary protective order placed by a girlfriend.

Hayworth’s supporters, meanwhile, say she is a natural fit in a white, wealthy suburban district, while Ball may come across as too strident.

“I’ve seen it in the way that she’s greeted with people,” said Jay Townsend, Hayworth’s campaign advisor. “There is a level of maturity that people in this district expect from their member of Congress. I don’t think they’d be comfortable with someone who is a rhetorical bomb-thrower.”

While most politicians come from careers in law or business, Hayworth insists that her decades of medicine will give her an advantage. In Congress, it will help her understand policy on small businesses (she opposes the stimulus plan, starting with the Bush administration’s passage of TARP) and on health care (she believes in deregulating the insurance industry). And as a candidate, it gives her nerve.

“When you’re a surgeon, you walk into the operating room and you have a plan,” she said. “You have to never lose your nerve, and keep your calm and make sure that everything turns out as it’s supposed to.”

She faces a bruising primary against Ball, who once paid someone to follow his opponent around in a chicken suit when he declined a debate and showed up to events with trash bags to accuse him of shady links to a trash magnate.

“Nan has a lot to learn,” said Westchester Assembly Member Joel Miller, who thinks she will attract voters’ interest nonetheless. “The primary is going to be very interesting.”

So far, Hayworth’s campaigning has been limited, though she did sheepishly admit to making an appearance at a local country club to hunt for votes and funds.

“I’m not arrogant. I make no assumptions,” she said. “I have a set of attributes that are rather different than Greg’s. The plan is to continue to make friends.”

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ABOVE: Nan Hayworth, right, took in a huge fundraising haul to emerge as a primary challenge, against Assemblyman Greg Ball in the race to unseat Congresman John Hall.