From a previous post...
Here are a few of my thoughts for new teams learning how to stand and ride out of the saddles on a tandem:
1. Riding a tandem is like ballroom dancing: You’ve got to dance to the same tune, someone's got to lead, someone's got to follow, and it takes practice to do it well.
a. By dancing to the same tune, the implication is that both captain and stoker(s) will need to use a similar out of the saddle riding technique or style. Some cyclists are bike throwers who use a lot of upper body strength to throw the bike back-and-forth as they climb, whereas others keep their bikes perfectly upright. If the captain is a bike thrower, then both riders will have to stand and ride out of the saddles, otherwise, most stokers will feel like a sack of potatoes on the back of the tandem, making them uncomfortable and the tandem hard to control. It’s worth noting, even smooth captains or teams will “rock the bike” if they use a pedal cadence that is too slow or as they tire: not even the pros are immune to this.
b. By leading and following, this reinforces the idea that both riders need to work as a team if they want to enjoy a smooth transition from sitting to standing and back to sitting. Part of this is tied to communication (addressed below) as verbal or in some cases physical or visual cues are needed to make sure the captain and stoker stand and sit in sync. It is noted that a light touch or hand signals are used by most teams who race, so as not to tip off the other teams that an attack is about to be launched.
c. Practice is another way of saying “Just Do It”.
2. Communication is essential: Use lots of verbal commands while you are practicing, encourage your riding partner to provide lots of candid feedback on what they are experiencing, and then critique your sessions and discuss what you think you could do next time to solve any noted problems.
a. As you refine your technique, your commands can be reduced to something like “Lets stand”… “OK”… “Ready”… followed by “Ready to sit”… “OK”.
b. Note that either the captain or stoker should be able to initiate the request to stand or to signal when it’s time to sit.
c. You’ll find that some teams use the “Let’s stand… on three”… “One, Two, Three…” to coordinate their stand while others will just key off of the captain’s movement, i.e., when captain stand, the stoker goes up. When the captain sits down, the stoker sits.
3. Learning to Walk Before You Run: Some teams do best by working up to standing and pedaling while others just “go for it” and work off the rough edges. For those who want to work up to it, there are a few things you can do as you ride to sharpen your skills and work off any anxiety.
a. The easiest first step is to simply find a relatively flat road where you can coast and then stand together without pedaling, aka. ‘The Butt Break’. Taking butt-breaks not only helps you to avoid saddle fatigue, it affords an opportunity for a tandem team to practice their communication skills as they prepare to stand, stand, and then sit while coasting and without the added movement caused by the pedaling motion. Teams can experiment with standing independently (best done only by the stoker, for obvious reasons to the stoker) or together, and can shift the down leg from right to left to get a feel for how the tandem will react as their weight shift from one side of the bike to the other (hint: if you lean left or right the tandem will too).
b. From standing and coasting it’s a pretty easy step to your first pedal strokes. As you are standing and coasting the bike should be slowing down which is good as -- assuming you haven’t shifted gears – you will have a bit more pedal resistance under your feet vs. what it was when you stopped pedaling and began coasting. As with standing, one of you will need to call out the command for, “Ready to pedal/go/whatever on three…” and then “one, two, three”. Away you go. Pedal a few strokes and then coast again or sit down and resume your ride. Critique your performance as you ride, decide what adjustments you need to make, and then give it another go. You could find you master this on the first try while others may have to keep at it a bit
c. Once you have a basic feel for how the tandem will react to how you move when you stand and feel comfortable with it, head for a moderate climb and give it a try there. However, do yourselves a favor by not letting your cadence / pedal rpms drop below 75 on your first tries. Again, pedaling at a low cadence invites bike rocking and the more the bike rocks, the harder it is to control. So, keep your cadence up on your first small hill climbs and you should find that you’ll have a bit more control and less bike movement. If you wait until you’re slogging up the hill at 45 – 60 rpm when you decide it’s time to stand, it WILL be significantly more challenging and that can be self defeating when you’re trying to learn. Over time, you’ll most certainly find yourself in situations when you’ll need to stand and grunt-out a climb but, it’s counter-productive when you’re trying to learn. Again, learn to walk before you run…
4. Advanced Skills: Once you have the basics down you’ll be able to work on improving your form.
a. If you have STI or Ergo shifters, you’ll also be able to practice shifting the rear derailleur while standing and pedaling out of the saddle. This is a normal thing for many teams to do, as when you get ready to stand on the flats or when attacking a hill you’ll always want to shift up into a next (harder to pedal / taller) gear so that your increased power will be matched with added resistance. Once standing you may find that you need to shift the rear derailleur up or down a cog and, so long as you’re still carrying a moderate degree of pedal cadence (~75 rpm), shifting shouldn’t cause you to loose too much momentum or cause the chain to slip on the cogs. The latter happens when your cadence drops and the drive train is loaded up with tons of torque as you grunt out each pedal stroke. Moreover, if you’re in a 28t or 30t cog, it’s rather easy to bend or fold a cog while shifting under a heavy load at a low RPM.
b. Perhaps one of the most exciting things to do with your standing skills is the bunch sprint... particularly for a county line sign. Again, if you can master the hills, you can master the flats.
Remember, the real key is practice, practice, practice combined with lots of communication.