Argus Tandems - What is YOUR perception of Tandem riding?

[GLuvsMtb]

So the Missus and I did the Argus on our Tandem. This was our first Argust riding Tandem and we had a great time!. It was however evident that the regular riders starting mostly behind us were not very clued up on how to ride with tandems.

1. We climb slower than you, so expect to slow down if you draft behind me on Blue Route and we turn off on our way to main road.

2. We have to take a wide turn on sharp turns. Trying to pass a tandem on the inside will probably mean that we all end up in hospital

3. Tandems are harder to stop. Passing a tandem on Boyes Drive and then stopping in the middle of the road will mean that you and your bike will come off second.

4. The stoker (my wife at the back) does work very hard, so your il-informed jibe of

- she's putting on make-up and not pedalling

- she's reading her book and not pedalling

- she's <whatever> and not pedalling

will only mean that we'll be doing a brake test after we've passed you coming down Chapmans Peak. My wife's learnt to tap me on the butt to show me she's ready (joke!, but don't make me...)

5. We need more space to get started at the water points, so seeing how close you can come pass us will lead to disaster.

6. We don't mind riders drafting behind us. To the guys that acknowledged our help on the flats, you're welcome.

[SeanMort]

We rode tandem in B group, the only tandem in the bunch, and you would think that riders that qualify to ride in this bunch would know how to ride competently for a start, let alone ride with a tandem in their midst. My pilot is a seasoned track rider, and at times he needed to gently nudge people back onto their line with his elbows and helmet, and said to them that he couldn't use his hands at that stage for the job as he dare not take them off the handlebars. Some riders co-operated, some took exception. At this level of riding you should be experienced in this sort of bunch behaviour and not overreact like a 2 year old. I've been in plenty of vets races where we're riding elbow to elbow and very seldom do riders panic and get hysterical. It's simply not enough to just be a strong rider, you've got to have some bunch skills and tone down the macho stuff. Being faster through momentum on the flats and downhills, but not at the front of bunch, meant we constantly had to feather our brakes to scrub off speed. Some riders behind us got a bit vocal then. What did they think we should do ? Carry on riding into the riders ahead of us ? We really wanted to be up front where we could be most useful, but riders were guarding their bunch positions across the road.

We managed to crest Edinburgh Dv, Boyes Dv and Smits' in the front 3rd of the bunch, and we did our turns on the front, but it seems like some in the bunch wanted us to do more, just because we were a tandem. We didn't mind being on the front, in fact we love it, but we also needed to recover sometimes, especially from hill efforts, because it's so much harder for us. At one stage we flicked our elbows for riders to come through, I then looked back, and saw the elbow flicking carrying on down the line like a Mexican wave. Funny thing was that their uncooperation caused the bunch to split in the drag towards Sun Valley, so we found ourselves chasing on the front again. We never did get back to the lead bunch and rode up Chappies with our B group lot, where we lost most of them. We expected to get dropped at this point, and had considered beforehand that from here we would largely be on our own until the finish, where we crossed the mats on 3H07. This was our 1st Argus as a tandem pair, and our 2nd race together after Bay City. We would have liked to have been in the racing tandems category, as we would have had a better result, but got put in B after the organisers averaged out our seedings.

 

I normally ride pilot on a tandem, with the other half as the stoker taking the brunt of the inane comments, but she is also well versed in how to get rid of those riders who like to make "the usual" comments and thereafter, having nothing much else in the way of pleasant conversation to make, choose to go silent and sit on our wheel. Her favourite thing to do for the "comment makers" is to get out her cannister of sunblock spray and start to apply it liberally on her arms and legs, with plenty of choking overspray blown into our draft. We also like to gear up and ride little rollers out of the saddle, leaving them behind to ponder their comments, as she is an amazingly strong rider in her own right. We have been in plenty races where riders have engaged us in good, enjoyable conversation, and have thanked us for the help. So it's not everyone. I must say that I have only experienced these silly commments as a stoker on one occassion, and that was from a fellow club member whom we then dropped like a hot potato.

[SyncSA]

As a relatively new cyclist (4 years) I never thought about tandem riding. Thank you for the informative post/s!

[CPT_Yank]

I started with G yesterday, but ended up riding with lots of tandems towards the end heading into Camps Bay. They were strong riders. They were both in front of me and behind me at one point. One thing I noticed is that they cut the line around curves, taking the shortest line possible. As long as I was in the single line behind them, it was fine, but I would not have attempted a pass on the curvy descent as it would have meant disaster. Is this true in general for tandem riding or was it just the group I was in yesterday?

[Big H*]

So the Missus and I did the Argus on our Tandem. This was our first Argust riding Tandem and we had a great time!. It was however evident that the regular riders starting mostly behind us were not very clued up on how to ride with tandems.

1. We climb slower than you, so expect to slow down if you draft behind me on Blue Route and we turn off on our way to main road.

2. We have to take a wide turn on sharp turns. Trying to pass a tandem on the inside will probably mean that we all end up in hospital

3. Tandems are harder to stop. Passing a tandem on Boyes Drive and then stopping in the middle of the road will mean that you and your bike will come off second.

4. The stoker (my wife at the back) does work very hard, so your il-informed jibe of

- she's putting on make-up and not pedalling

- she's reading her book and not pedalling

- she's <whatever> and not pedalling

will only mean that we'll be doing a brake test after we've passed you coming down Chapmans Peak. My wife's learnt to tap me on the butt to show me she's ready (joke!, but don't make me...)

5. We need more space to get started at the water points, so seeing how close you can come pass us will lead to disaster.

6. We don't mind riders drafting behind us. To the guys that acknowledged our help on the flats, you're welcome.

 

Do not be such a Wuss...... Get confidence and learn to ride your Tandem properly. You ride it like you ride any half bike. You have to earn respect on the road not command respect.

 

Get used to it that the half bikes WILL treat you like a slipstream slut. You just concentrate ALL the time to make sure you know where they are.

Edited March 13, 2012 by Fantom

[water bottle]

Hi Seanmort. We were the Cycle Lab tandem that rode with you guys on Campsbay road. I shouted to you to get on our wheel, but I think you were just overworked by then. Riding RT is not fun, they are very good and cofident riders - excluding us - but they dish you quickly on the hills..

 

What I did enjoy is the support for tandems on Edinborough and SB. Very specific support for tandems...they understand the effort needed to get our sorry asses over the hills.

 

As for the singles that ride on your wheel, that's racing. I don't have a problem with them, but some are real aerosoles with their aggressive attitude to cut infront of us, even though we were riding on the sides going uphills.

[Tjokkits]

the day i want to file for divorce me and hubby will get onto a tandem, we just have too much of a will of our own to do such things. apart from that, whilst i clearly have no idea what i am talking about, i dont see the logic of staring into somebody's backside the whole way, and breath recycled USN poluted air

[SeanMort]

Hi Seanmort. We were the Cycle Lab tandem that rode with you guys on Campsbay road. I shouted to you to get on our wheel, but I think you were just overworked by then. Riding RT is not fun, they are very good and cofident riders - excluding us - but they dish you quickly on the hills..

 

What I did enjoy is the support for tandems on Edinborough and SB. Very specific support for tandems...they understand the effort needed to get our sorry asses over the hills.

 

As for the singles that ride on your wheel, that's racing. I don't have a problem with them, but some are real aerosoles with their aggressive attitude to cut infront of us, even though we were riding on the sides going uphills.

 

Yep, that was us. We figured it wasn't worth the energy to shave about 40sec's off our finish, so we trailed behind instead. We would have fared much better with the RT group though from my previous experience. We had no real power issues going up the climbs with B group, but you do work much harder than a single. We did the Bay City race a few weeks back over Boye's Dv, Smit's (and then Ou Kaapse), and we had faster time splits then which equated to a 3rd place finish for us. My pilot is still a tandem newbie, and we're still getting into sync. His real talent is track and crit racing, but he's got a load of Argus sub3's and a Giro under the belt so he's good to go. The other-half wants me back on our tandem now though. We've done a lot of tandem racing together. She did the Argus with her dad again this year (she's a stoker) and they came in on 3:30 (she wanted to beat last years 3:20 with her dad). Seems like everyone had slower times this year.

[DJR]

I rode tandem with my 11 year old who did his first Argus. It was SUPER fun! We enjoyed the amount of tandem specific support from the crowd. Lots of people also chatted to him and encouraged him, which was wonderful. There were the usual comments about him not pedalling, but it was always followed up with something positive. Tandem riding brought a whole new level of enjoyment to my own riding.

[Big H*]

the day i want to file for divorce me and hubby will get onto a tandem, we just have too much of a will of our own to do such things. apart from that, whilst i clearly have no idea what i am talking about, i dont see the logic of staring into somebody's backside the whole way, and breath recycled USN poluted air

 

One day when you grow up you may just understand how important it is for a couple to function as a team. It has sweet blowall to do with "a will of your own" The collective experiences we have on our Tandem just serves to strengthen our bond as a couple.