“With any job you want to be able to switch off whether your partner is in the same working industry or not.”
Shannen Kiely says her relationship with Scott Pye is not too dissimilar to the norm, despite the fact they hold key positions at rival Repco Supercars Championship teams.
Kiely is the managing director at Erebus Motorsport, where she’s worked since 2016 – following stints at Lucas Dumbrell Motorsport and Walkinshaw Racing.
On any given race weekend this year, the Erebus garage lies adjacent in the pit lane to neighbouring Team 18, the squad which Supercars Championship race winner Pye drives for.
Working in the same industry but for opposing outfits is not new to the long-term couple, as Kiely explained in the latest edition of the Parked Up podcast.
“He’s a driver, I’m looking after the operational and commercial side of the business, so our jobs are very different as well so it’s not like we are completely competing against each other,” said Kiely.
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“Although we are competitors in teams, we’re not against each other in terms of what our actual job is as well, so I suppose it works in that sense.
“We might have a bad day and vent to each other that we’ve had a bad day for whatever reason that is but won’t necessarily go into detail as to the specifics of what’s going on because they are different teams,” she added.
“So we don’t dive too far into it if there’s things that shouldn’t be known.
“But luckily we’re in very different roles in the team, so Scott is looking to make the car go faster and how he’s going to find tenths of a second around a race track. If he decides to describe any of that to me, I’ll be completely frank, I don’t know a thing what he is talking about.
“If it’s the commercial aspect or the operational aspect of the team, then that’s where my role lays, so that’s what I’m focusing on.
“So the things he is focusing on are completely different to mine and I think that’s where it works – we’re not competing directly.”
Regardless, Kiely notes the importance of switching off – although if an issue is encountered, they can relate to one another perhaps more than most.
“I suppose the positive is that we both understand each other’s industry so it makes it a little bit easier in that sense,” she said.
“The travel, the pressures of the industry as well, it certainly makes it easier and the fact that we understand it entirely given that we are both in it.”
Erebus Motorsport promoted Kiely to managing director last year, having previously held the position of general manager of communications.
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