Tandem bicycling can be anything from a weekend hobby to a way of life for the rally participants who gathered Friday morning at the Waterfront Inn in The Villages.
Villagers Jan and Bob Thompson, were handing out ‘route sheets’ to the teams for ‘mass rides’ on Saturday and Sunday mornings — ranging from 20 to about 60 miles. One 56-mile round trip route will take participants to Lake Panasoffkee and back, with several rest stops along the way, through some scenic rural areas before returning to the Waterfront Inn.
“This is our final tandem bicycle rally for 2014,” Villager Kathryn Foster said. “This is our fifth year — and 49 teams are registered from nine states — Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Louisiana, Minnesota, North Carolina, Ohio, Oregon and Virginia.” The sponsor is the PANTHERS, a statewide club centered in The Villages. Panthers is an acronym for Partners Aboard Neat Tandems Happily Enjoying Riding Simultaneously! “These are not competitive races,” Bob Thompson explained. “Some riders pedal faster than others, but there are no prizes. This is all about enjoyment and camaraderie.”
The license tag on Tom and Carol Lilley’s vehicle — ‘BIKN VAN’ — said it all. “We moved from Virginia Beach to Chesapeake, near Norfolk, where we live now, because traffic was too dangerous for us to ride our tandem near the beaches,” Tom Lilley confided.The couple had just come from the Southern Tandem Rally in Columbus, Georgia, “We ride for fun,” Carol said. “We’re a little slower than some of the folks, but that’s the way we enjoy it.”
“We’ve visited The Villages 10 times,” Tom said, “and we really like it. We live in a 50-and-up adult community ourselves, with a nice clubhouse and pool, and like living there because we are close to our kids and family — but The Villages is amazing. Every time we come here, it’s gotten bigger.” “It’s more like fifteen times,” Carol said.”We have friends here. We find people in general are very friendly, and each year we meet up again with some of the cyclists who were here for previous rallies.”
Tom and Gerry Ferraro, from Palm Harbor, Florida, who cycle tandem with the Sun Coast Bicycle Club, had breakfast at the hotel before heading out to ride. “We live between Tampa and Clearwater,” Tom said, “and this is our first time here in The Villages. We like what we see so far — this place is amazing — and we will be seeing a lot more of it before the weekend is over. How many square miles did you say this place is — with over 100,000 people — I can’t believe it!”
The cyclists had enjoyed watching the dragon boat teams practicing on Lake Sumter from their hotel room windows and seeing them do group exercises with their paddles in the parking lot — pedals and paddles!
“The Villages is like a giant playground,” Gerry said. “We like cycling around our towns, but then, we’ve taken tandem cycling vacations too. We took a Tauck tour one year out to the Napa Valley wine country in California. We rode for many hours there, stopping only for rest breaks and lunches at the wineries along the trails. It was funny one year, I was riding on the back of our bike with my backpack full of wine bottles to take home. Tom has also gone cycling in Italy.”
Mike & Terry Smith, from Portsmouth, Virginia, ride tandem two or three times a week with the Tidewater Bicycle Club near their home. “We ride near the beaches,” Terry said, and call ourselves the EGRETS, which stands for ‘Energetic Group of Riders Exercising Tandem Style.’ Â “It took us a while to come up with that name,” Mike added, “but it works. Tandem cycling is a great hobby. You keep fit and you enjoy the outdoors. It’s exhilarating.”
“But let me ask you why,” Terry said with a grin, “a cold front comes in every time we visit The Villages? It never fails.” Overnight temperatures were slated to dip to the low 40s for the weekend. The Smiths are not bicycle competitors. “We enjoy traveling around the country. We meet new people everywhere, and when you attend a rally again, you find ‘old friends.'”
For more information, call Kathryn Foster: 305 608-1450 or visit floridatandemclub.org.
