COVER STORY partnership comes into its own, and over the years, Chris has mastered the technique of bouncing – and the art of listening to Michael’ s instructions as they progress.
“ If there’ s a lot of mud on the course, or if there’ s a section where we have to stop and restart, Chris will have to bounce,” he explains.“ Sometimes, though, I need her not to bounce, because the motion causes me to lose the feel of the car a bit, so I am always shouting out instructions for her to respond to as we go up the hill.
“ Knowing when to bounce, when not to bounce and which side of the car to bounce on is actually quite a challenge. When we’ re heading up the hill, it’ s also very easy to miss a gate so Chris will also be instructing me – looking and pointing where to go with her left hand, rather than doing it verbally.”
The pair had known each other for a while before they started competing, so Michael was confident that Chris would take on the challenge with relative ease. However, even when a couple gets on well together, there is always the occasional tense moment of pressure during competition that can stretch each other’ s patience.
“ I’ ve got mates who stopped trialling together because of that,” says Michael.“ Inside the car it’ s a different situation. It has sometimes tested us – doing an event in January in an open-top car when the temperature was below freezing, for example! – but we dress for the conditions, prepare well, and Chris is always happy to get out there and do it!
“ We are life partners, so the first challenge was to make sure she was safe because if you get too enthusiastic, you can potentially get hurt. After that, it’ s just about having fun. I wouldn’ t say we’ re very good at it – but if you look at the people that are, you can clearly see that they always get on and that really is the key.”
“ Ultimately, you’ ve got to get on. That’ s the number one thing. If you’ re the driver, you have to understand, particularly when you’ re doing a road event, that the passenger’ s job is not easy. If you get to a junction and the passenger’ s a little bit unsure of which way you should go, you’ ve got to not shout at them! Give them time.
“ What we love most with the Classic Trials is that they take us to all sorts of places and give us time to look around. It’ s a weekend out, so it can be more than just doing the event. In some cases, we have taken friends on road trips to show them places that we’ ve discovered through doing Trials.
“ If we do well on a particular event – and that is not necessarily winning an award but just doing better than we normally do – it’ s always a shared thing and we’ re both there in that moment. It’ s nice to be able to experience things together, rather than having individual achievements that we just tell each other about.”
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The test of a sold partnership is in rising to the challenges, remaining positive, and having fun!
Revolution- August 2025
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