Hobbes: I remember when....
 

MOVED FROM USPSPRO's new Calfee thread....

WARNING: The following is a bit of a rant. My apologies to anyone who might feel slighted by my diatribe in advance.

Lance, anything posted by the island guy, cycling advocacy and on and on and on and on. When I was visiting with old and new friends at the Eastern Tandem Rally there were a number of folks on hand who I actually came to know first through Hobbes back in the 90's (the good old days). Almost to a person they have all tuned-out and dropped off the list because of the major shift away from hard-core tandem content to whatever a minority of very active posters want to flood the list with. It really is a shame because at one time there were actually Hobbsian gatherings and dinners at the major rallies back when there were a lot of folks on Hobbes who truly loved tandems and tandeming and knew the best place for tandem enthusiasts to go was, you guessed it: tandem rallies! I mean, a lively thread on the internet about tandems can be enjoyable, but riding along side another enthusiast enjoying the sport while talking about tandems and putting you hands and eyes on the hardware is the best. But, I digress...

Yes, Lance owned and rode a couple different tandems. He had a Cannondale that he rode with his first wife and she wrote a wonderful article that was carried on the Orange County California tandem club's website for a while that recounted some of her rides with Lance. During Lance's recovery from cancer he was seen at two different events riding a Litespeed with his Oconolgist.

He also captained tandems for special guests along with Miguel Induran at a few fundraisers.

However, I've also heard an account of a chance encounter by a tandem couple whom we know from Colorado with Lance and his posse where they jumped on and rode in for a while. Right after jumping on Lance purportedly turned and acknowledged the couple on their tandem by noting "Hey, look... a divorce machine". This was well after his split with his wife.

Like I said, your comments ring true with many former Hobbsians so don't feel like the Lone Ranger. On the bright side, if it wasn't for Hobbes going south I wouldn't have found BikeForums.net's tandem list and well, I'm pretty darn happy here as almost 99% of the content is right on target and 99% of the folks here come to share or learn (vs killing time) so there is an upside. Well, that and I can go back and fix all of my typos since I rarely proofread before posting (bad habit).

Yeah, but you're smart and type fast. These forums kill me because I have to think and I can't type 50 wpm. I thank all who post here. Stoker and I hope to get fast enough to be able to attend a tandem rally without feeling, well . . . slow. And we're thinking about . . . shudder . . . dare I mention it . . . a foreign tour next year. But first we need a lot of conditioning and a new drive train!

100 - 120 wpm depending on how cogent my thoughts are; it's a curse...

I think that's one of the misconceptions that a lot of folks who ride tandems have about tandem clubs and tandem rallies... you don't need to be fast or willing to ride long distances to enjoy the rides and camaraderie.

In most cases, just like the subscribers of Hobbes and this list, he folks who attend rallies cover the full spectrum of average cyclists: some very fit and fast that ride and train almost daily, folks who only get out on weekends and others who only get out when they can.

All one needs to do at a rally is to look for folks who look like you (trust me, they're there) and ask them what ride route they plan to do and if they'd like some company. At rallies that feature mass starts and a common route for the first 10 miles or so the natural selection process will sort out the A - B - C level riders and most folks will find themselves paired up with others who ride at their level and form fast friendships... assuming the folks they find are the least bit sociable: there are some exceptions as it is all aspects of life.

Anyway, just something to think about.

Perhaps replies with tandem content could put a special identifier in the subject line, like "*Warning: Tandem Content*". That way the people not interested in other subjects could send the replies without the identifier directly to the Deleted Items (or Garbage) folder. I may even join rather than just using the archives.

Yet another indicator of Hobbes fall from grace, even Alex Wetmore's fabulous search engine stopped archiving messages back on Dec 17, 2008. What a shame but not unexpected.

Having attended numerous tandem rallies since 1975, we can attest to the fact that there are different strokes for different folks at tandem rallies.
Back then we rode pretty well with the A bunch; as we became more senior, we now hang back and have fun with slower and shorter ride folks.
Yup, still great riding TWOgether!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem