Pups38

DaveQ. I am single as well but have a gf and I don't want her riding with me. We do enough stuff together that she doesn't have to ride with me. If that makes me a bad guy well so be it. LOL

GlennR

If the husbands and wives were not complaining then why do you care?

My wife only rides in the neighborhood, but maybe a e-bike will get her to ride with me. It would make a great birthday present.

noglider 

I've seen many couples where the man had the much nicer bike, probably because he's more into bikes than she is. But it exacerbates the advantage men already have. Now, when my wife and I ride together, I sometimes ride a heavier bike than hers.

We once took an overnight trip, and I towed our luggage in a trailer, and she carried nothing. It seemed fair to both of us.

We started riding a tandem last year. We are still getting used to it. It takes a lot of learning. My hope is that it will improve her endurance, and I'm referring to the number of HOURS she can stay on a bike. Right now, that's her biggest limitation. The greatest distance we've ridden on the tandem is 12 miles round trip.

Carbonfiberboy 

Tandeming had a very positive effect on my wife's strength and endurance. The first thing I did when we got our used CoMo Speedster was to add his and hers HRMs. They have to be ANT+ or one ANT+ and one Polar. I have a readout for mine, while she has a readout for both of us. Note that I do not have a readout for hers! Once you both know how your VT1 and VT2 HRs relate and have a little experience with it, stoker can match her output to yours so that ideally you both get exhausted at the same time. VTs are a very quick and easy way to approximate what is usually done by lactate threshold testing: https://www.acefitness.org/blog/1165...ng-vt1-and-vt2

We quickly found that on the tandem my wife was riding at a lower and steadier effort that she did on her single when she was trying to keep up with me, trying to improve, etc. Riding at a lower effort automatically allowed her to ride longer, and as we know, distance = strength. We gradually got into doing more hills and riding harder, etc. I think we rode for ~1 year before going out on our first 40 mile hilly group ride. In our 3rd year we started doing some loaded touring. We've now ridden double centuries and a Gran Fondo type of event. This year, our 10th on the tandem, we have a 300 mile supported bike tour coming up at the end of April.

For many years now, I've done almost all my outdoor riding on the tandem. We've been doing ~3000 miles/year. Tandeming makes me strong like nothing else. My single is a rocket ship now.

noglider 

Thanks for that, @Carbonfiberboy. I'm not sure we are devoted enough to justify all that research and equipment. But I will give it some consideration. Maybe we can use this idea as an inspiration to do something similar but more modest.

I am 56 years old, and she will turn 66 this year. She's very thin, especially in her limbs and seems to have low potential for building muscle mass. When we take a 12 mile ride and average 10 mph, she makes a remark at the end about how her legs are burning. So this is what we're dealing with.

I don't mean to be a downer. We are interested in fitness, and to the degree possible, we would each like to build strength, and heart monitors might make sense for us.

Carbonfiberboy 

I'm 71, Stoker is 67. If her legs are burning, she's going too hard, totally. Thin is good! Spin faster. I've known many thin stokers and they typically spin ~100. Bust your butt! And never put it on the stoker. Everything is your fault. "Stokers never make a mistake." Not her deficiency, yours. See how that works? Love! After a hard ride, we've been known to go out for dinner, get Mexican. For her birthday I got her a new saddle and new PI Elite bike shorts. We've been together 43 years.

ClydeTim

I'm lucky I guess! My wife started riding tandem with me when we were 33, early bloomers I guess!

But yeah, that burns me up. I have several friends who want their wives to ride with them and keep up. I understand that but they ride high end roadies, then place their wives on low end hybrids and MTB's, then complain they don't keep up. They give the wives low end shorts then get upset if they complain about saddle soreness. Not to mention, low end saddles.

I myself ride a $2000 bike, my wife rides a $3000 bike. I upgrade her wheels and hubs to Dura Ace as well. I give her every advantage she needs to keep up and make it more enjoyable for her.

I ride mid level shorts, she rides top of the line shorts. Luckily she prefers a mid priced saddle at about $60 vs her most expensive.

It worked, 20 years later she is still out there riding with me and the boys and keeping up, sometimes dropping them.

Doug64

How the heck do you guys make these things work?

Retro Grouch 

Why does this bike need brakes?

bobwysiwyg

Pretty cozy seating I say. 😀

Biker395 

My wife really isn't interested in riding bikes. We do a lot of skiing, however. Maybe an e-bike might change her mind.

On the bright side, my daughter just suggested we do a century ride this spring.

Bmach

My wife has an electric assist bike and she now rides with me. We bought for just that reason, so we could ride together. Before we rode slow and she did not enjoy it because she knew she was holding me back. No matter how much I tried to convince her it did not bother me she was not happy. Now we are enjoying riding together and she loves passing me on hills. Of course she has to learn to stop harassing me for not being able to catch her on anything steeper than 4%.

If you want an ebike great, if you want a tandem great, whatever you ride at least you are out riding.

jon c. 

I slow down a bit riding with my wife. I enjoy the change of pace.

B. Carfree

My wife and I would be outliers in your group. We bought our first tandem when we were in our twenties (and still do most of our joy-rides on a tandem thirty years later). We have also set up our tandems so she rides captain, even though I am eight inches taller and outweigh her by sixty pounds. It's not control issues, it's adding a second set of eyes to the road and preventing motion sickness issues for her. (We do route the shifting and drag brake to the stoker's compartment, so she doesn't actually have full control.)

We don't use HR monitors. She can hear my effort in my breathing since my head is right behind hers, so if she was inclined to equalize our relative efforts she could easily do so. However, there is something fun for us about running me down a bit on a climb and having her step up to save us.

Different strokes, or in our case, stokes. It's all good.

Garfield Cat

The answer is to do day hiking. Its also a time consuming activity. And communicating is allowed. Unless you insist on a faster pace.

Besides, you get to go off road whereas you would not have done so with a road bike, electric or otherwise. This leads to maybe another bike, the gravel bike.

donheff

I always ride with my wife and would probably ride a lot less if she dropped out. I will be 69 this summer and am a more cautious rider after a smashed collar bone and a busted hip from bike crashes. As I age out I will gladly add a e-bike to my collection if it helps me keep riding when I might otherwise give up. And, if she encounters problems I would recommend the same for her. From what I have seen of them high end e-bikes don't replace all riding they just assist when the going gets tough.

h2oxtc

I understand that everyone will have their own unique perspective on riding with spouses ...

For me this is why I like to ride with my wife, and the reason I converted one of her road bikes to e-assist. For those occaisional rides where we could travel further distances at a speed that I am comfortable with. Not neccesarily limited to the length, and more importantly the amount of climbing that she would otherwise be comfortable doing.





I chuckled with your comment about not being able to catch her riding steeper hills. One of our first rides together with my wife riding the e-assist, a guy on an S-Works flies past us riding up a hill. I suggested that she catch up with him, which she did, and following him to the top of the hill. I don't think he ever knew, or suspected it. I arrived at the top several minutes later.

We ride what, where and how ... and with whom, each for our own reasons. It's all good as long as everyone is enjoying the ride.

noglider 

@Carbonfiberboy, wow, thanks. It's inspirational. I learn a lot from you.

Bmach

Noglider, , if interested in gaining strength I would suggest lifting along with cycling. Strength training has benefits for all ages. You could join a gym or get your equipment, it is not expensive.

coominya

Well perhaps you need to toughen up a bit so you're not offended when a man expresses an opinion other than the one you hold.

Being married doesn't mean you can't have a life of your own you know and since 50% of marriages end in divorce it makes good sense to have a proportion of your life that's separate from your spouse.

noglider 

I've been lifting for about a year now. It's very rewarding. I just use a barbell in my bedroom. I'm reading more and plan to branch out a bit. My wife does it a bit, too. I do it nearly every day now.

DaveQ24

Not in my book, Bro! Believe me, been there, done that in the past.

JanMM

Have been riding with my wife since we met 39 years ago - most of our together-riding has been on tandems since 2000. Of my 4600 miles in 2016, 1400 were on our tandem. Fun times.