Allana and Mark Burgess
Ian Wilson Photography
MOTORSPORT PARTNERSHIPS
“ At that point, Allana was at the age where she could sit in, so she sat in with me until she was old enough to do it herself. At first, it was a new experience for them both, but they were both really keen and got the hang of it pretty quickly. In the end, she bought her own motor, Jake took mine, and I became the passenger!”
Allana and Mark Burgess
Cross Country Competitive Safari Staffordshire and Shropshire Land Rover Club
Allana Burgess has been going to Cross Country Trial events with her family since she was three months old. Now, a couple of decades later, she sits in the driving seat with her dad Mark alongside her, often competing against her older brother Jake, with her mum Joanne taking control of the timing.
It is a family passion that dates back to 1986, when 21-yearold Mark joined a friend to watch an event and got hooked.“ I used to drive myself until my son nicked my motor,” he smiles.“ I often had a different person navigating at every event, but when Jake came to the age where he could sit in, he did two years with me driving then started to drive himself.
The Burgess family all participate in Competitive Safaris, also known as Comp Safaris, which are the most exhilarating of Cross Country events. They involve driver-navigator teams taking on multiple runs on a challenging off-road course of up to nine miles, competing against the clock in a variety of car-related classes, with penalties handed out for any markers they hit.
Allana’ s first event was when she was 16, sat alongside her 23-year-old brother, and she recalls how calm he was behind the wheel.“ Jake and I get on really well and we are pretty good at working together,” she says.“ Nothing fazes him, whereas I am a bit more frantic, so I used to love sitting in with him because he just kept me calm.”
If Jake is calm, however, Allana describes her dad Mark as“ so relaxed, he’ s horizontal” and that turned out to be a real help when she first got behind the wheel. She chose an event in Evesham to make her debut and admits now it was“ probably the worst one I could have picked” for her first time out.
“ It was basically a woodland track with constant trees lining the route and I did not know what the car would do, or when it would kick up, so I was absolutely terrified,” she admits.“ I was a bit cautious, but dad was just saying‘ you are doing really well, take it at your own pace’ and that made me feel calmer. It took the pressure off everything bar the driving bit.
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Revolution- August 2025