skidder

I borrowed one from a co-worker for a weekend, tried experimenting with it as a touring rig, a version of an 'xtra-cycle' with the panniers on the rear. Didn't really work out that well. The thing I remember most about it was the big turning radius created by the wheelbase that made it inconvenient to turn around on a street or a MUP.

Q: Whenever I see a couple riding one, its always the man in the front and the woman in the rear; any reason for that? I know the majority of the power driving the wheels comes from the person in front, but I've never seen a female up front and wondered if some of you with a complaining S.O. have ever tried it the other way around (so she sets the pace).

honcho

Yes, it's very typical to see mixed gender teams with the male up front. From our experience it seems to make sense for the heavier (and perhaps stronger) rider up front as it takes some strength and body english to get things going and maneuver. I'd like to be a stoker at times but whenever we've tried it, even on bikes that were adjustable for for our height difference, the 80 lb weight difference between us made it difficult for my partner to control the bike. When I've ridden our tandem with a partner the same weight as me, the dynamics are very different even though my regular and much lighter partner is very fit and has excellent endurance.

JanMM

We first rode a rental tandem in 1978 at Cades Cove in Great Smoky Mtn National Park. Fun, but we continued to ride single bikes together.



Didn't ride one again until we bought our first one in 2000.The goal was to ride together when we rode the Hilly Hundred and other rides. Fun, and we met the goal.


After a decade riding the KHS tandem, we moved on up to riding a RANS recumbent tandem in 2011. No slower and much more comfortable for longer rides.


We enjoy riding tandems by ourselves (the two of us) and with others on club rides - including with our local tandem club and at the last several annual Midwest Tandem Rallies, with hundreds of other Tandemists. Still much fun. But, we also now enjoy riding together on single bikes - my stoker on her e-assist Trek and me on one of my RANS bikes.

bargo68 

This.
I have bikes, she's got yoga and it keeps us separate and yet together.

Retro Grouch 

Mrs. Grouch and I have ridden tandems together for decades.

My take is that riding a tandem is more about the company than it is about the ride. The reason for riding a tandem is that you have a companion that you want to ride with who is unequally matched physically with you. That makes it hard to ride singles together. There is no way we'd still be cycling together today were it not for the experiences we shared riding our first crummy old tandem.

bikecrate

There was an entry in CL someone posted in the Wacky thread where the seller called his tandem the "argument machine". I've never ridden one, but based on my experience with my wife on a tandem kayak it will never happen. After zig zagging down a river and crashing into numerous objects I finally asked my wife to stop paddling.

Wildwood 

My story = same as most others. Bought tandem to ride with spouse. Selected one based on her criteria. Didn't work out with her. After a month of rides, maybe 5 or 6, the 'reason' not to ride she settled on was "What would happen to our children if a car hit us?" It got re-purposed to haul 2 children to school - very popular at the elementary school, where it was dubbed the Seuss-mobile. Then I had a number of stokers, 2 very strong ones. Also a cyclist who had gone blind, a few seniors from a Senior Center fitness program group. My advice for anyone buying a tandem is have at least one 'back-up' stoker before spending your $$$.
edit: contact (or join) an active tandem cycling club, and you will be amazed at some of the diverse requests to try to be stokers.

tgenec86

It's been a very long time (1993) but a good friend of mine had a tandem. His wife was an absolute monster sprinter and I was winning practically every Cat.2/3 race in the Tidewater VA area so the two of us teamed up on the Cannondale racing tandem for the stereotypical Tuesday Night World Championships Training Ride. After about an hour we got to know each other's form and really hit a groove. There is one very long stretch of road way out in the country with only a few turns and as soon as we made the turn onto it, we sprinted from the very back of a 30 rider group, hit the front and put the hammer down in a steady intense race pace effort. Seven miles later the group (mostly racers & fit club riders) was blown all over the course with maybe two left clinging desperately to our wheel. That was FUN. Sadly, my wife doesn't ride, so that was my one and only tandem adventure.

indyfabz

File me under "never." But I have drafted a lot of tandems.

Chinghis

When I was a kid, we had a yellow Schwinn tandem at our school. We'd play "chicken" with it. Not a good idea.

A few years later, a bike-dealer friend of mine got a Santana. We went for a night-time ride on a lakeside bike path. Absolutely terrifying, but fun.

The wife categorically refuses to contemplate it. Maybe some day on vacation or something.

FiftySix

That's something my wife would actually ride with me. Of course, I'd still be doing all the pedaling.

wolfchild

There are two things I don't like and would never ride. One is a tandem and the other is a recumbent. No thanks.

noglider 

I bought a tandem a few years ago. My wife was not keen on it, and it took a while until she tried it. And she was terrified. But she got over it, and we ride it a bit. Sometimes we do errands on it, as in this picture. My hope is that one day it will enable her to ride longer and farther, but that hasn't happened yet, and maybe it won't ever. She usually prefers to ride her single, and that's OK. She can't ride very long or far.

Wildwood 

Never say never.
You don't know what you are missing.
The best things in life should be shared.
Growing old is not for sissies, nor easy on the stubborn.


Besides -
don't forget, two strong riders on a tandem BLOW AWAY 1/2 bikes.

descend at 50mph on a lwb recumbent = no prob. With a full length neoprene body sock on a Calfee Stiletto and Fast Freddie's skills = glorious to witness.

Machka 

I've also ridden a recumbent ... most of the time I'll try different bicycles just to see what they're like!

https://www.flickr.com/photos/machka...57602327322020

Rajflyboy

nice setup

hopefully she gets more into riding this Tandem with you

Gresp15C

I once saw a Schwinn tandem parked, and noticed that it had one of those old Bendix 2-speed kickback coaster brake hubs on it. Now that would be a divorce machine!

Hermes

My wife and I started riding a tandem in 1980. We have done charity rides, self contained touring in Mexico, rode the coast of California from Monterey to Santa Monica and have done tours with Santana tandem in the US and internationally. And we race our tandem in time trials and did one UCI mass start 55 km tandem race in Tahiti in 2018. We also race road and track in timed and team events.

Riding a tandem brings out the best and sometimes the worst in a team. Working as a team is totally rewarding. Success functioning as a team has been some of my best cycling experiences of which riding and racing a tandem is one of them. Some may argue that riding a tandem is a compromise. I would say that it is about having a goal and honing ones skills and learning new ones to achieve the goal.

This pic is from a 20K tandem time trial in 2018. I rig the tandem with clip on aero bars and my wife has speed bars which clipped onto the stoker stem to bring her arms together and lower her position.



Here is the same course and time trial race but we did it on TT bikes as a two person team.



At the start of the race in Tahiti 2018.



We pre rode the race course the day before the race and here is a pic from the road side just outside of Papeete.

Miele Man

I haven't ridden a tandem in decades. When my niece was younger I used two cut apart bicycles and had a competent brazer braze the frames together into a tandem. My niece loved being able to go on long rides with me. She still talks about those rides and that bike.

Cheers

veganbikes

I rode a tandem briefly with a co-worker and it did not go well. There was a couple from Europe traveling across the country on a crackandfail tandem (something modern) and they needed a place to store it since the house they were staying in couldn't take it so I said sure as long as we get to ride it. I do really want to get a tandem though and get more practice in as we were just screwing around with no real intention of going distance.

Kapusta

We call it a Divorce Horse.

Kapusta

I’ve ridden one once, but the back seat was empty, so that probably does not count.

Never had much interest. My wife is actually more open to the idea than I am. I guess I do like the idea of being able to pedal as hard as I like and she can totally keep up.

noglider 

I must say, it's hard to captain a tandem. I have to balance for both of us and manage our speed and cadence. I can't turn my eyes away very much. It's even hard to scratch my nose, because taking one hand off the bars is dicier than on a single. Because of the lower power-to-weight ratio, I have to shift gears often, and it's like shifting a tractor-trailer: we go from bottom gear to top gear and back again in a short time. I put a mirror on my spouse's handlebar and ask her to keep watch, but she has trouble remembering. I have a mirror on my glasses, but sometimes her head is in the way of my view. I ask her to do the signalling, and that works out well.

I think I'm going to paste a note on my back to remind her of the commands I'd like her to use. I can't hear her as well as I'd like, so the commands should be short, such as "shift up" rather than "we're pedaling too fast."

SLOW
SHIFT UP
SHIFT DOWN
STOP
SIGNAL LEFT
SIGNAL RIGHT
etc

Retro Grouch 

It's been said that whichever way your relationship is headed a tandem bicycle will get you there quicker.

martianone

We had a tandem....
for a while,
i am tall,
navigator (sometimes also referred to as stoker) is untall.
Navigator did not like the view,
side by side on single bikes is better for us.