Princess Anne’s daughter, Zara Tindall, and husband Mike Tindall are getting candid about the highs and lows of marriage.
“I think it all depends on the sort of scenario. I think it’s very easy when it’s around sport or whether it’s around the animals and the kids,” Mike, 47, said on the Wednesday, October 14, episode of the “Talk Horse” podcast about communicating with Zara, 45. “Obviously, other nuances become more difficult.”
He continued, “I don’t think either of us necessarily chase out confrontation until it happens. That’s, sometimes, not the best way of doing it, but then when it happens, I think we’re both pretty good at actually talking about it. You’ve just got to try and muddle your way through. It’s never easy, is it?”
Zara and Mike have been married since 2011, going on to welcoming daughters Mia, 12, and Lena, 8, as well as son Lucas, 5.
“Sometimes life is hard, then when kids come along, and you’re trying to still compete, fortunately,” Mike noted on the podcast, also acknowledging how Zara is balancing parenthood with her equestrian competitions. “When Mia came along, that was my last year [playing rugby]. I haven’t been a professional athlete whilst the kids have been around. Having to juggle being a mum … it can be really hard at times.”
According to Mike, most of the couple’s disagreements revolve around their children and scheduling events.
“I don’t get it right all the time, by the way, but you’ve got to try and do it whatever ways you can,” he quipped. “We’re like, ‘Is this time-sensitive?’ … This weekend, I’m going to take the kids to a college football game, and she’s like, ‘Well, you’re not going to watch me run cross-country?’ I said, ‘Well, last time I didn’t watch you [and] you won the British Open for the first time, so maybe not having distractions and kids around could be part of the issue?’”
For Mike, he tries to “stay out the way” during Zara’s race days given his own preferences from his tenure as a professional athlete.
“I stay out the way on cross-country day, let her focus and do everything you do. Try and make a laugh every now and again to remind her it doesn’t have to be, you don’t have to be that serious,” Mike stated. “And then afterwards, depending on how it’s gone, you react in the appropriate way. Either it could go really bad, but you know it’s the time to have a joke, or it could it have gone really well where you can go, ‘Well, you almost f***ed up there,’ or ‘You did this.’ I think that’s where you, sort of, know those nuances where you can either lean in, lean out. I think that’s how and why it’s worked so well.”
