Originally Posted by zonatandem
Test ride/rent/borrow a tandem first. Have someone who is a tandemist show you how to mount, ride a tandem. First ride it solo, so you learn how to handle a l-o-n-g bike.
If possible, ride with an experienced tandem rider, both as stoker and then as pilot. Only when you gain some confidence should you put your wife on the bike.
Key to riding as a tandem team: Communicate!
Pilot/captain (the person up front) must tell stoker/rear admiral (the person in the back) what they are about to do. Voice the command: shifting, braking, coasting, pedal, coast, stopping, slowing, etc.
Stoker does all the signaling (left, right, slowing) upon captain's request, that way you keep your hands on the bars.
Stoker feels totally helpless as she can't really see what's in front of her and has no control whatsoever.
However it relieves her of the responsibilites of steering/braking/shifting.
If you take it easy and ride predictably, she'll readily take to riding 'in tandem.'
We've been doing it for 32+ years and many thousands of miles, and are still happily married!
Pedal on TWOgether!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem
That is very good and learned advice. I heard the same from other experienced tandemists when my non-cycling wife decided she was game to give it a try.
Instead of following their advice though, I bought a used early 90's Burley Duet in good condition. Our first ride was about two miles, our second was just under 20, five weeks later we did our first tandem metric.
Three months later I found a second hand, but barely used Trek T2000 at a very reasonable price and sold the Burley for what we paid for it. We've been riding the Trek for almost a year and a half.
Considering the costs / benefits of lots of other hobbies and interests, I think this has been a very minimal investment to find out if this is something that we want to pursue for a longer term and spend more money on.
We've had an absolute blast all along the way since we've started tandem riding and have made some wonderful friends among other tandem riders as well as the single riders who like to draft behind us.
We're now shopping custom travel tandems that are priced exponentially higher than our initial purchase less than two years ago.
Rent it or buy it, the most important thing to do is ride it!