Tandem Cycling - Poll: Do you ride in phase or out of phase and which do you like better?

This thread has gone ring crazy!:rolleyes:

In any case, just wanted to say that after our New Mexico ride last week I was discussing the Hermes thread (IP versus OOP in Tandem Time Trial Races) with my stoker and she said she missed IP:eek: :rolleyes: :D !!!

So here we go again...:)

It is an endless discussion. In cycling, there is no substitute for power, endurance and smooth pedal stroke. All of which need lots of saddle time and coaching to develop. OOP is an interesting technical twist that allows the tandem team to tune their individual power and torque curves in interesting ways to achieve objectives. I suggest trying different configurations and see what works best for you. There is no right answer.

I think tandem racers, who race a few times per year and are not consistant tandem riders, do not have the time to really tune the phasing to optimize the team and would not believe anything without power meter measurement and repeatable results on the bike which is not practical on a tandem. So I think that is why they are all in phase. It is logical and no one has an advantage over the field or gives up advantage to the field.:)

The ring did NOT work with FSA 10 Speed. .5-1mm too much space between the teeth of the small ring and medium ring. Initial shifts I did were fine but chain dropped between the teeth of the two rings and stuck putting an end to this experiment.

FWIW: You can most likely use different size spacers to adjust the ring spacing to make this work. Most better-quality bike shops will have a wide assortment of widths.

Somehow I missed the talk about the Q-Rings in this thread until now (I guess the IP/OOP subject threw me).

We've been using the Q-Rings for about 3 months now. We're successfully using them on an FSA Carbon triple crank w/10-speed Dura-Ace. We've never dropped the chain between rings, but have experienced some loss in shifting quality. Shifting from the middle to big ring is slow & requires an extra nudge (or two). And, we do get some chain scrub on the inside of the big ring while in the middle ring / 2 smallest cog combo. However, the middle ring is only a 40, while we have the 54 big ring. I do believe with a 42 or 44 middle ring, most of these issues would resolve themselves. Shifts between the small & middle rings are actually better than before, likely due to the smaller 10t difference (30t small, 40t middle).

We are certainly not spinners, we ride slower cadence with more power. The Q-Rings fit our style well. They are very efficient (for us), smooth, and easy on the knees. We've done several long distance rides with lots of climbing (300k - 400k) since installing the Q's. No knee pain at all. We weren't plagued with knee pain prior, but anything over 200k with considerable climbing would yield at least knee aches. Standing together is smoother than before, as it minimizes the "surge/pause" effect. Our top speed isn't any faster, but we're able to maintain the same averages for longer distances.

Oh, to stay on topic...we ride IP

"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance--that principle is contempt prior to investigation" Herbert Spencer

I am embarrassed to admit that I have been reading this thread with much contempt for all the OOP'ers. My way is right! I know this even though we've never tried OOP. I assumed they argue the merits of OOP so vigorously because they are in the minority. Well, sometimes the minority-voice is right. We must see for ourselves. So, in an effort to avoid being kept in everlasting ignorance my stoker and I are doing our Saturday century OOP with an open mind (even though it must be wrong).

I'll be sure and let you all know which of you are in the wrong after our experiment:) .

Pat & Gabrielle
TEAM COW ROCKS!

Team cow
wow! To me it sounds like you are trying to set yourself up for failure. :eek:

Your first try at OOP is going to be a century... no shorter test rides first? I am not sure any proponents of "this way" would recommend that.

There are various degrees of OOP that people try... some with the capt. leading... some the stoker.

I would recommend you bring tools :rolleyes: have fun :D

glenn

wow! To me it sounds like you are trying to set yourself up for failure.....There are various degrees of OOP that people try... some with the capt. leading... some the stoker. I would recommend you bring tools.

I'm not sure I'd bring tools, but I'd make sure there was enough slack in my timing chain to allow hand-derailment so that you could revert back to IP in the event that OOP creates any dischord. It also allows you to swap back and forth as part of the assessment process, at least that's what we did at the front-end and back-end of our experimentation with OOP.

Being OOP only made itself known to us when we were starting or felt the urge to stand and hammer which was wholly incompatible with my slopping bike-throwing riding style. Rolling along with a high cadence going the only hint that I had we were OOP from the captain's perspective is what I saw in our shadows, although Debbie's perspective as stoker was somewhat different as she had to reconcile the egg-beater like churning of our legs/feet/cranks in her periperal vision with her previous experience riding IP.

Bottom Line: So long as a century is a regular distance for y'all and you go 90* OOP, I can't see where there would be any physiological risks or issues given your team's level of fitness. However, messing around with anything in between 90* OOP and having the captain or stoker's cranks leading by a link or so to bias pedal feedback / initial resistance could become problematic since someone will be dealing with a disproportionate amount of the "load" compared to IP or 90* OOP.

Team cow
wow! To me it sounds like you are trying to set yourself up for failure. :eek:

Your first try at OOP is going to be a century... no shorter test rides first? I am not sure any proponents of "this way" would recommend that.

There are various degrees of OOP that people try... some with the capt. leading... some the stoker.

I would recommend you bring tools :rolleyes: have fun :D

glenn

I had the same reaction. You guys appear experienced so I thought...not a problem. But a century is a long way for a test run.

'Century is a long way to go for a test run . . .'
OOP/IP it's still a hundred miles!

"There is a principle which is a bar against all information, which is proof against all arguments and which cannot fail to keep a man in everlasting ignorance--that principle is contempt prior to investigation" Herbert Spencer

I am embarrassed to admit that I have been reading this thread with much contempt for all the OOP'ers. My way is right! I know this even though we've never tried OOP. I assumed they argue the merits of OOP so vigorously because they are in the minority. Well, sometimes the minority-voice is right. We must see for ourselves. So, in an effort to avoid being kept in everlasting ignorance my stoker and I are doing our Saturday century OOP with an open mind (even though it must be wrong).

I'll be sure and let you all know which of you are in the wrong after our experiment:) .

Pat & Gabrielle
TEAM COW ROCKS!
I bet that if you do the century and decide that we OOP'rs are wrong, you will feel wird when you go back IP.

RR and I went back to IP after the Time Trial. There is a noticeable difference in power. We are doing the smaller hills quicker now and she feels much more comfortable doing a double standing hill attack than OOP. We are planning to attack Cantelow next to see how it goes.

Wow, you guys are freaking me out!
Ok, ok, we'll go out and try 20-40 miles tonight first.

By the way, the thread comment that convinced us to try this was the one posted by transam in which he cited his four concerns prior to the experiment, three of which we're exactly the same as ours.

1)We'd no longer be able to stand to go up hills
2) Fast cornering would be impossible
3) Our pedal stroke would be jerky

We weren't concerned about the fourth item "others tandem riders will think we look weird". I think it's obvious that when your ride around on a cow-painted tandem wearing cow-spotted jersey's, others thinking you're weird isn't really on your list of priorities, ha, ha!

However, we felt the stongest argument for remaining IP came from tandem geek when he said his stoker likes the whoosh, whoosh, whoosh sound. Boy, if we have to give that up it will probably be a deal breaker!

Pat & Gabrielle
TEAM COW ROCKS!

Thank you all for talking me out of the OOP century tomorrow. Tried OOP tonight. EEK! :eek: Maybe we didn't try it long enought to "get used to it", but if you can't get used to it in two hours then why would you want to?

I guess it was ok spinning along on the flats, or even the slow steady climbing. But, as soon as we put some serious tourque on the pedal to sprint, or came out of the saddle with high cadence to hammer over the crest of a hill it was a mess! Totally threw the rhythm off!

Our advice: If you want to smooth out your pedal stroke buy a set of tandem rollers and practice spinning.

Mark us down for tried OOP and went back to IP.

TEAM COW HAS SPOKEN!:D

As a newbie, just found this thread. In the late 80's I did quite a bit of tandem time trialling with a couple of partners. One evening was a 25ml club event on a 'lumpy' course, quite hilly, and my best time with my mate Eric before on this course was a '57'. Just before the race I had to make some quick adjustments to chain tension on the front (we used a straight through drive with an eccentric bottom bracket) and when putting it back together inadvertantly put the cranks about 45degrees out with the front pair leading. We ended up doing a '53' and we never felt so smooth. It wasn't till we finished and someone pointed it out that we realised. I think that with one crank leading the 'top dead centre' effect was overcome. Needless to say we kept on doing it! I feel that 90 degrees may be to much, try it with 45.

Thank you all for talking me out of the OOP century tomorrow. Tried OOP tonight. EEK! :eek: Maybe we didn't try it long enought to "get used to it", but if you can't get used to it in two hours then why would you want to?

I guess it was ok spinning along on the flats, or even the slow steady climbing. But, as soon as we put some serious tourque on the pedal to sprint, or came out of the saddle with high cadence to hammer over the crest of a hill it was a mess! Totally threw the rhythm off!

Our advice: If you want to smooth out your pedal stroke buy a set of tandem rollers and practice spinning.

Mark us down for tried OOP and went back to IP.

TEAM COW HAS SPOKEN!:D

It must be the cow paint job.:eek: :D