Has anyone else ridden their tandem on a banked track, indoor or outdoor?
In our 'tandeming life' we've ridden track only twice.
First time at the Kenosha, WI outdoor track as part of the fun at the second Midwest Tandem Rally in 1977.
Second time at the Major Taylor Velodrome at Indianapolis, IN, during the 20th Midwest tandem Rally in 1995.
Have to give stoker Kay tons of credit for taking on this daredevil assault on a steeply banked track!
Within one lap, we were at top speed in the biggest gear, hanging practically off the edge of the track in the curves, then swooped down, full tilt, to the inner lane. Our stomachs felt they were being pushed against our backbone. What a ride!
The gutsiest tandem couple of all was a female pilot, with her blind husband as stoker, doing fast laps. He had the biggest grin on his face!
Of course at the Taylor 'drome we also had 3 guys on a triple . . . talk about power!
Have any others ridden (or would like to ride) track on a multi-seater?
Pedal on track TWOgeher!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem
The BikeForums Team
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We live about 400 metres from the only track in London. Haven't ridden the tandem on it, but back in my racing days I used to be a regular in the local track league. My wife and tandem partner was also good on the track and won the British Universities pursuit championship about 6 years ago.
I now only ride my fixed gear bike to work with a front brake of course. The local track do have road training days once the evenings get lighter, so maybe we should try it on the tandem. Track riding either on singles, tandems, road or track bikes is highly recommended.
LWaB
It is a lot of fun (when I used to race with a blind stoker) but I'm glad I've never had a front tyre blow out. The stories of the results did worry me a little.
On tandem, rode the outdoor 333m Brisbane velodrome but also indoors at 250m Perth and indoor/outdoor 250m Ghent.
r-dub
In my shop I had a beautiful tandem track Pogliaghi w/ full record hanging on the wall for a couple years...never got a chance to try it out (needed some work) before the owner took it back.
gregm
I posted this on [T@H] last month...
I rolled into VeloSport in Berkeley on the tandem early this morning,
as my shredded Cinelli cork ribbon was getting embarrassing -- way
beyond electrical tape as a solution.
Chatted with one of the shopkeepers who had a little tandem story. He
rode in Vancouver from 1956 through 1959 on a board track that had
been built for the British Commonwealth games. In 1959, he
encountered a (then) five-year-old fixie single speed track tandem
hanging on the wall in a local bike shop. He had to have it, and
scraped together everything he had to make it his.
Penniless, how would he and his buddy get back to Berkeley?
Yup! They pointed the fixie south.
They carried what they had in canvas and leather under-seat bags.
They found that a good strategy was to roll into a small town around
5pm, and somebody would usually give them a meal.
Whew.
PaMTBRider
We rode the Lowe's Motor Speedway at the southern tandem rally in 2004. This isn't a great pic but it does show that we were up on the banking
zonatandem
Whoa! That motor speedway is a heck of a lot longer than any track!
Would still be a hoot to ride it.
AD-SLE
What the heck. I don't have a tandem of my own yet but I have stoked for a guy on his tandem. I lived in Evanston, IL at the time. About 15 years ago. The summer between grad school years I got back into biking putting a lot of miles on in that beautiful area. A bike buddy had a Santana tandem which he and his wife rode. One day he got a wild hair and asked if I would stoke. Why not I thought. We did this a couple of times and two relatively young fit guys can push a tandem pretty good. One time he asked me if I had ever ridden in a velodrome. Heck no!! He told me there was an outdoor velodrome nearby and we could go give it a try.
Well, the rest is history. For a stoker the best, no only thing to do is to put your head down, close your eyes, and just go wide open as the captain gets increasingly confident in the physics of the line. IIRC our max was just under 40 mph as we terrorized the singles. They were kind and stayed out of the line as they waited in anticipation of a spectacular wreck. We dissapointed them as we rode off and back to the house....at a much reduced pace!
I wonder if that old outdoor velodrome is still there? Any one here know? Nothing like being young and industructable. I think I broke my collar bone later that summer while on a casual rail to trail ride. Payback!
Richard Kennedy
Here in the UK there is an annual national track tandem championships. It's a sprint event of approximately 1000 - 1500 metres (depending on the size of the track hosting the event), it's only for track tandems i.e. fixed gear, no brakes. Sorry, no gears and brakes here! I've ridden the championships a dozen or so times, there are also occasionally other tandem track events, mostly involving visually impaired stokers. I've raced track tandems on a variety of tracks, ranging from 250 metre indoor wooden tracks with 45 degree banking to outdoor tarmac tracks of 450 metres or more.
Tandem racing on the track is great fun, however track tandems are a nightmare! They are generally designed with much shorter wheelbase and steeper angles than road tandems to improve reaction time and manoeuvrability. Unfortunately that meens that they handle dreadfully at low speeds (compared to a road tandem or track solo), once up to 20 miles per hour or so they handle great.
This is the gallery of the 2005 UK championships. (I'm in some of the photos, dressed in black with a female friend of mine stoking on the back, she's wearing red and white and we're riding my 1970s Bob Jackson track tandem)
http://www.britishcycling.org.uk/gallery/2005/05_Newcastle_Tandems.shtml