A Bicycle Built for Two
Tandem Riding
In April of 2004, my wife and I decided to buy a tandem bicycle. This was not a decision to be made lightly as good tandem bikes are pricey, not to mention the possible strain on our marriage, i.e. I can’t get away from my wife when she pisses me off as she’s literally riding right behind me.
Our Cannondale Tandem
As my type A personality dictates, I spent a good month and a half researching tandem bicycles on the ‘net and trying to find a used one for sale. I decided on a used tandem to be our first tandem bike. I didn’t want to spend too much on a bike that may never be used again by us if the experience is not to our liking. By the month of May I had found a used 1999 Cannondale RT 1000 owned by a couple in Houston, Texas. They claimed to have put in only 500 miles on it and that it was in great condition – the price, about $1400. It was a good deal so we picked it up. The bike was as advertised; pearl white with a mixed bag of Shimano components on it. Ultegra shifters, 105 front derailleur, XT Deore rear derailleur, with a 9 speed cassette.
Club Ride
One of your first considerations when getting ready to ride a tandem for the first time is who is the captain and who is the stoker? The captain sits up front and steers the bike, applies the brakes, and shift the gears. The stoker sits in the back and pedals. In our case this was an easy decision, as my wife has never learned how to ride a bicycle. She comes from a tiny village in Mexico with dirt roads and never owned a bike.
Club Ride
Your next consideration is to understand the Primary Rule of Tandeming as put forth by Bill McCready of Santana Bicycles, a noted tandem bicycle company. This rule states:
The Stoker makes no mistakes
In other words, my wife can make no mistake on the tandem that can cause us any problems. It is my responsibility to ensure the bike stays upright and we follow the correct line while taking a turn. The primary rule does not say that the stoker has no responsibility. The stoker should do nothing that causes the bike to become unstable or something unnatural on the back of the bike, etc. The primary rule does not say that the stoker must not berate the captain for going too fast down hill, for not applying the brakes when the stoker says so. Pretty much, the stoker has a lot of control over the bike. If my wife feels we’re going to fast and asks for the brakes I must comply (safety considerations always apply however.) Our Cannondale even has a drum brake that is controlled by a lever at the stoker position. So my wife has control over that brake but I have asked her to let me know when she plans to use it as I don’t want to try to accelerate out of a dicey situation only to find my rear wheel is being braked. This of course does not stop her from yelling out, “brake,” whenever we’re screaming down an 8% grade. She’s asking me if she’s got permission to activate her drum brake. And that’s another thing you will learn about your tandem; it will really scream going down-hill. You’ve got a real heavy bike, what with two riders and all, so it doesn’t take much of a down-grade for the bike to really pick-up speed. On the other hand, the bike can be shear torture on the slightest up-grade. Our front crank is a triple and we did use the “granny” gear in the beginning but that was long ago. We’ve put in nearly 3000 miles on the tandem in the little over a year we’ve owned the bike. We now pride ourselves on never using the smallest gear on our triple.
Drum Brake and Rear Derailleur
Our tandem has Look pedals for both the captain and stoker. So getting the bike going can be a challenge and there is a right way to do it. We use the method where I, the captain, straddle the top tube and apply both brakes. My wife than steps on the left pedal and “clips in.” She uses this pedal as a step to mount the bike. My wife now clips in with the right pedal. At this time I am completely holding up the bike as my wife is clipped in. If I stupidly drop the bike, she’s going with it. Remember the Primary Rule, if the bike falls over, my wife, the stoker, is not at fault at all. My legs are spread fairly wide apart so that my stoker can back pedal the front crank into the right position for me - I like to have the left pedal in about the 2:00 position. If I didn’t keep my legs spread the pedal would whack me in the shin. I now clip into the left pedal and say, “push.” This lets my wife know that we are starting out. As I push down on the left pedal that pedal “lifts” me up and I sit down on the saddle. I then clip in my right pedal and off we go. Stopping is pretty much the reverse of the above. My wife never unclips from the pedals unless she is going to exit the bike. When we stop at traffic signals I am the only one that unclips and keeps the bike upright, my wife never unclips. I don’t recommend you ride in towns or cities with a lot of traffic and traffic stops until you and your stoker get real comfortable starting and stopping the bike.
In the beginning, communication between the captain and the stoker can be a problem. I always communicated with my wife when I planned to shift up and especially when I planned to shift down. You need to build in time to coast and ease the stress on your butts, and I would call out when I was going to stop pedaling and start coasting. But after a month or so, my wife could “feel” when I was going to shift and when I was going to ease up on the pedals. After a year of riding I rarely have to say anything about shifting or pedaling, she just senses it and complies. When we are climbing a steep hill we’ve learned to “honk” the bike one at a time. We tried to climb out of the saddle together but could never get the timing down. So our method involves only one of us climbing out of the saddle or standing on the pedals at a time. It’s actually kind of neat when we start on a steep climb. I’ll jump out of the saddle first and take the first half of the hill, and as I sit down my wife jumps up and takes the rest. We’ve even started riding with the local bike club, The A.V. High Desert Cyclists, on their Sunday ride. My wife is a strong rider and with all the training I do for solo bike racing we make a formidable tandem team. Everyone wants to draft the tandem but there are only a handful of riders in the club that can stay in our draft without getting dropped. Give us a slight down-grade, like heading East on Ave K between 110th St. West and 70th St. West in Lancaster, and there is not a single rider in the club that can stay in our tandem's draft. My wife and me have actually hit a speed of 52 mph in that stretch of road with its 2% down-grade and the ever constant West wind of the A.V. at our backs.
My wife and I are hoping to upgrade and purchase a lighter tandem for time trials and century riding. I’m thinking about the Co-Motion or a Santana tandem. But with prices starting above $5,000 we’ve got to save our pennies first. In the mean time, we’ll both jump on our Cannondale at 0530 on a summer morning, strap on a backpack filled with a picnic lunch, and head off for a 70 mile ride.
In April of 2004, my wife and I decided to buy a tandem bicycle. This was not a decision to be made lightly as good tandem bikes are pricey, not to mention the possible strain on our marriage, i.e. I can’t get away from my wife when she pisses me off as she’s literally riding right behind me.
Our Cannondale Tandem
As my type A personality dictates, I spent a good month and a half researching tandem bicycles on the ‘net and trying to find a used one for sale. I decided on a used tandem to be our first tandem bike. I didn’t want to spend too much on a bike that may never be used again by us if the experience is not to our liking. By the month of May I had found a used 1999 Cannondale RT 1000 owned by a couple in Houston, Texas. They claimed to have put in only 500 miles on it and that it was in great condition – the price, about $1400. It was a good deal so we picked it up. The bike was as advertised; pearl white with a mixed bag of Shimano components on it. Ultegra shifters, 105 front derailleur, XT Deore rear derailleur, with a 9 speed cassette.
Club Ride
One of your first considerations when getting ready to ride a tandem for the first time is who is the captain and who is the stoker? The captain sits up front and steers the bike, applies the brakes, and shift the gears. The stoker sits in the back and pedals. In our case this was an easy decision, as my wife has never learned how to ride a bicycle. She comes from a tiny village in Mexico with dirt roads and never owned a bike.
Club Ride
Your next consideration is to understand the Primary Rule of Tandeming as put forth by Bill McCready of Santana Bicycles, a noted tandem bicycle company. This rule states:
The Stoker makes no mistakes
In other words, my wife can make no mistake on the tandem that can cause us any problems. It is my responsibility to ensure the bike stays upright and we follow the correct line while taking a turn. The primary rule does not say that the stoker has no responsibility. The stoker should do nothing that causes the bike to become unstable or something unnatural on the back of the bike, etc. The primary rule does not say that the stoker must not berate the captain for going too fast down hill, for not applying the brakes when the stoker says so. Pretty much, the stoker has a lot of control over the bike. If my wife feels we’re going to fast and asks for the brakes I must comply (safety considerations always apply however.) Our Cannondale even has a drum brake that is controlled by a lever at the stoker position. So my wife has control over that brake but I have asked her to let me know when she plans to use it as I don’t want to try to accelerate out of a dicey situation only to find my rear wheel is being braked. This of course does not stop her from yelling out, “brake,” whenever we’re screaming down an 8% grade. She’s asking me if she’s got permission to activate her drum brake. And that’s another thing you will learn about your tandem; it will really scream going down-hill. You’ve got a real heavy bike, what with two riders and all, so it doesn’t take much of a down-grade for the bike to really pick-up speed. On the other hand, the bike can be shear torture on the slightest up-grade. Our front crank is a triple and we did use the “granny” gear in the beginning but that was long ago. We’ve put in nearly 3000 miles on the tandem in the little over a year we’ve owned the bike. We now pride ourselves on never using the smallest gear on our triple.
Drum Brake and Rear Derailleur
Our tandem has Look pedals for both the captain and stoker. So getting the bike going can be a challenge and there is a right way to do it. We use the method where I, the captain, straddle the top tube and apply both brakes. My wife than steps on the left pedal and “clips in.” She uses this pedal as a step to mount the bike. My wife now clips in with the right pedal. At this time I am completely holding up the bike as my wife is clipped in. If I stupidly drop the bike, she’s going with it. Remember the Primary Rule, if the bike falls over, my wife, the stoker, is not at fault at all. My legs are spread fairly wide apart so that my stoker can back pedal the front crank into the right position for me - I like to have the left pedal in about the 2:00 position. If I didn’t keep my legs spread the pedal would whack me in the shin. I now clip into the left pedal and say, “push.” This lets my wife know that we are starting out. As I push down on the left pedal that pedal “lifts” me up and I sit down on the saddle. I then clip in my right pedal and off we go. Stopping is pretty much the reverse of the above. My wife never unclips from the pedals unless she is going to exit the bike. When we stop at traffic signals I am the only one that unclips and keeps the bike upright, my wife never unclips. I don’t recommend you ride in towns or cities with a lot of traffic and traffic stops until you and your stoker get real comfortable starting and stopping the bike.
In the beginning, communication between the captain and the stoker can be a problem. I always communicated with my wife when I planned to shift up and especially when I planned to shift down. You need to build in time to coast and ease the stress on your butts, and I would call out when I was going to stop pedaling and start coasting. But after a month or so, my wife could “feel” when I was going to shift and when I was going to ease up on the pedals. After a year of riding I rarely have to say anything about shifting or pedaling, she just senses it and complies. When we are climbing a steep hill we’ve learned to “honk” the bike one at a time. We tried to climb out of the saddle together but could never get the timing down. So our method involves only one of us climbing out of the saddle or standing on the pedals at a time. It’s actually kind of neat when we start on a steep climb. I’ll jump out of the saddle first and take the first half of the hill, and as I sit down my wife jumps up and takes the rest. We’ve even started riding with the local bike club, The A.V. High Desert Cyclists, on their Sunday ride. My wife is a strong rider and with all the training I do for solo bike racing we make a formidable tandem team. Everyone wants to draft the tandem but there are only a handful of riders in the club that can stay in our draft without getting dropped. Give us a slight down-grade, like heading East on Ave K between 110th St. West and 70th St. West in Lancaster, and there is not a single rider in the club that can stay in our tandem's draft. My wife and me have actually hit a speed of 52 mph in that stretch of road with its 2% down-grade and the ever constant West wind of the A.V. at our backs.
My wife and I are hoping to upgrade and purchase a lighter tandem for time trials and century riding. I’m thinking about the Co-Motion or a Santana tandem. But with prices starting above $5,000 we’ve got to save our pennies first. In the mean time, we’ll both jump on our Cannondale at 0530 on a summer morning, strap on a backpack filled with a picnic lunch, and head off for a 70 mile ride.
posted by Bob Grove at 3:52 PM
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