ddmonkey – Member
Love the bodge but can’t get my head around why anyone would want to ride a tamden off road. What do you get out of it compared to riding solo? Doesn’t it just hold you back in terms of what is rideable? Is it just a another different challenge?
Can completely understand what you’re saying, and tandems certainly won’t suit everyone and not everyone will ‘get’ it.
We went for a tandem over 10 years ago mainly because Sandy didn’t want to become ( and I didn’t want her to become) a biking widow. There’s a 15 year age gap between us, and at 40 she’d hardly ridden a bike since childhood, nevermind off-road. The main reason was that she suffers with ME, so that would always limit how much and how long she could ride. The tandem allows us to ‘share’ energy so she gets to join in in a way that she never would on a solo. It’s also a great leveller – forget most things about riding solo, they don’t work on a tandem!
Does it hold us back? Well not really. I ride solo to do more techy stuff, and we choose tandem routes that suit a tandem. For example Nan Bield is great but on a tandem would be insane, but we’ve ridden most of the Peak District trails, red routes at GT & Kirroughtree.
So the answer to ‘is it a different challange’ is yes, a completely different challenge.
For example the red route at GT on a solo is enjoyable, but (IMHO) not that challenging. Try getting a tandem to climb the switchbacks and each corner is a victory! Stuck in a rut? Forget trying to bunny hop out of it, tandems don’t hop, or wheelie, they just do brute force!
Bit of a long winded answer, but hopefully makes sense 🙂
Cheers,
Rob