Maybe a strange question, but here goes. My husband and I are both confident riders who bike commute daily in a hilly and congested city. We bought a new-to-us tandem after borrowing a friend's for a long weekend in the country and having several great rides. Fast forward a few months, I love riding stoker, but he can't seem to get past the slightly panicked, death-grip-on-the-bars phase of riding captain if we're anywhere other than flat, empty trails (and yes, we tried him riding stoker- he nixed that before we even started pedaling).

It's an older Burley duet, plenty of lateral rigidity and very stable handling (I've captained it with a newbie stoker, it was fine). I'm doing my best not to "fight the bike" and since I feel quite relaxed back there I don't *think* I am. We are pretty evenly matched size-wise and power-wise though, so maybe I'm creating more movement in the frame than I think?

I've considered jury-rigging the cable routing so that I can take over shifting responsibilities and give him less to worry about - - but I also understand all the reasons why this is a terrible idea. Do any experienced captains out there have any other suggestions for building my captain's confidence so we can enjoy riding this bike together?