Tandem: Maiden Voyage @ Night!

This evening (Wednesday) Joe and I had the privilege to finally give our new tandem a shot on the trail. We’re hoping to race it this weekend, but I’ve yet to get a confirmation if the race organizer @ SC Velo will let us. So in the mean time, we practiced!

We met up @ the world famous Fullerton Loop. Here’s Joe and I going over some of the details of the bike. From my previous tandem experience there’s quite a bit of a balancing act that the captain and stoker will need to do. Joe is a quick learner and figured out what I meant by not leaning towards the direction he would want to go. Since I have more muscle mass and weigh more than Joe (I was a former power lifter back in my day), it made sense that I was the captain.

This is our obligatory close up shot. We learned that my hydration pack serves as an easy access snack storage for Joe and I. We can basically keep our food, energy gels and what not in there and when the need arises, Joe can simply grab it out of my pack and even feed me from the back, it’s pretty clever and romantic…ooooh!

Took a breather during the ride.

This is us after the ride.

We were both impressed that the $250 tandem held up during the ride. Only 2 things came up, the rear brake started fading on me. Those are the OEM pads that have been in there since 2002. So I’ll be swapping them out before the race. Then by the end of our ride, I noticed that the rear derailleur has started mis-shifting. That’s an easy fix that I can do within 3 minutes. Other than that, our experience was great! We had a blast and we couldn’t believe how FAST we were going. We climbed the hills with ease, but took it a bit easy on the downhills. But on the flats, that’s where we were flying. I called us a “freight train on wheels.”

We were so happy with our test ride that Joe got a bit giddy and gave me a squeeze on my muscular butt cheek. Not being used to that kind of attention (I prefer my left cheek), I was taken a back, you can tell by my reaction…

Hopefully you’ll see us race this weekend @ the Mt. Sac Fat Tire Classic, let’s just pray that the powers that be at SC Velo will allow us. SC Velo…we just want to ride!