Times Colonist Article, Friday April 30 2010

These riders are getting that syncing feeling as they prepare to head out on a four-person bicycle trip across the country. From left, Jeff Belanger, Ben Miller, Brenton Seamone and Ian Bevis plan to roll out Wednesday on a 6,100-kilometre journey they call The Tandem Tour, from Victoria to Halifax. Each ri

Photograph by: Darren Stone, Times Colonist, Times Colonist

Where one of these guys goes, the rest are sure to follow -- even if it's all the way across the country.

Four friends have decided to add a twist to cycling from coast to coast by taking on the challenge in perfect sync, on a bicycle built for all of them.

Ian Bevis, Jeff Belanger, Ben Miller and Brenton Seamone have been doing plenty of practice rides on their customized four-person tandem bike, and plan to start their 6,100-kilometre journey from Victoria to Halifax on Wednesday.

Their unusual conveyance was built for them by Rodriguez Bicycles of Seattle.

Each rider in The Tandem Tour, as the two-and-a-half-month camping journey is being called, is making the effort for his own special reason. Hence the motto for the trip -- four guys, four causes, one bike.

For Bevis, the ride is to support the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation in memory of his close friend Eva Markvoort, who died in March after a lifelong battle with CF. The University of Victoria student was given her degree by school officials just before her death.

Bill Markvoort, Eva's father, will be meeting up with The Tandem Tour on the first day of the trip when they roll off the ferry at Tsawwassen.

He will then ride with the group to Fort Langley for an evening fundraiser.

Belanger is riding for the Canadian Diabetes Association because his brother is diabetic, Seamone is riding for the Multiple Sclerosis Society in recognition of his mother and Miller is riding for Friends of Red Tail, an environmental organization in Nova Scotia.

Seamone said when he and his friends began talking about the excursion several months ago, the plan was for a leisurely bike trip across the country.

"And then these guys stared getting wild ideas."

The members of The Tandem Tour, all either 23 or 24, came together when they attended UVic. Two are from Fort Langley, one is a Vancouverite and one is from Halifax.

"We're super excited," Bevis said. "It's an awesome bunch of guys. We're all really good friends, so we're going to have a lot of fun."

Proof of that is a new set of speakers strapped to one of the four sets of handlebars to provide mood music along the way.

The bike weighs about 29 kilograms on its own, but is a 385-kilogram behemoth with all four strapping lads in their seats.

It takes about two minutes to take apart and six or seven minutes to reassemble.

"Everything's beefed up. The front fork has extra tubing welded on," said Seamone.

Another friend, Ben Gulliver, will be shooting video segments and plans to put a documentary of the trip together. For details or to make donations, please see www.thetandemtour.com.

jwbell@tc.canwest.com

© Copyright (c) The Victoria Times Colonist

The Tandem Team has been spending a lot of time together lately to get ready for this trip. From our home base of Cadboro Bay, Victoria BC, we plot and plan the inner workings of our soon to be adventure. Well, actually, the adventure has just began.

We spend most of our days together, thinking about what needs to be done next, and how we can work together to get it done. Miller gets going on the "follow-up" calls, or as i like to call them "get ready to be shut down by another non-sponsor call." Big Bear Brent starts doing some man-stuff right off the bat. Like building a trailer. That's right, Brent is building the wooden trailer that will be pulled behind the trusty Tahoe. I either send some emails, call my mom, or play the guitar. Oh, and plan the route. We did that yesterday too. And by golly...Ontario is going to be a long way across. Ben Gully usually starts off his Tandem Day by ordering some camera equipment off the internet. Im not saying, but there may or may not be some aerial photography going down.

But alas, yesterday morning we awoke to the beautiful sun shining down on us in beautiful Victoria, and we knew what we had to do first. Go for a ride. A big ride. The biggest yet.

We dusted off our helmets, and saddled up the quad-tandem. After some light maintenance, We took off up the massive unbelievibly large hill that is Sinclair Road. With Big Bear at the Stern and Jeffy B sitting stroke seat, we had our work cut out for us. With one of the lightest at the front, and Big Man weighing about 50lbs. more than him at the back, the ol' quad Tandy was struggling and swinging around like a snake in heat. Remember, this bike is 12.5 feet long hub to hub.

As we turned down Mackenzie Ave. We had to make a change of seat positions. With Big Bear now closer to the Front, we made a short stop at the bike shop to get the computer working, then took off down the galloping goose trail towards the ferries.

Dodging cat calls from supporters and hecklers alike, we peddaled on. It was a beautiful spring day in BC, and we were cruising. Our average speed was an easy 30km/h

We reached a top speed of 50km/h...shit.

On our way home, we took the good ol' Pat Bay highway. It was a little nerve wracking peddling alongside semi's, but it is something we knew we had to get used to, so we put our heads down and peddled.

Just before we reached home, we were stopped on an uphill, and had to re-start. We all got on the power stroke, and 3...2...1...crunch. We bent the outer chain sprocket on the rear casette. to much power on. Once again, a crash analysis. What did we do wrong, and how will it never happen again. This is how we deal with problems. Learn our lesson, and move on. Luckily our friends at the Quadra Bike Shop fixed it for us. What a bunch of guys.

Tonight we are having a fundraiser BBQ, and all the boys are coming in from Victoria to show off the bike to our Vancouver friends. Today is a good day.

www.thetandemtour.com

here are some pics of the bike!

Yesterday the four of us hopped on the bike and took it for a spin. After some extremely jittery moments, we seemed to get the hang of it. With Big Bear Brent at the helm, I truly felt safe. With Miller at the helm, I felt a little more nervous. But we will all learn how to pilot this beast in time.

In order to pilot this thing correctly, we all have to work in complete unison. That means the Captain calls out commands, and each man down the line repeats it to the man at his back. We have to "power on" to get it going, and then pedal away while the captain controls the braking system, the gear shifting, and the navigation system.

We powered out of Cadboro bay, Victoria, and up the hill to Cedar Hill, towards UVic. We cooked it up the hill, and were going twice the speed of other cyclists. As the rain poured down, our emotions quickly turned from fear, to excitement. We will truly have to work as a team in order to make it across the country.

We Got the Bike!

Yesterday was a most eventful and pivotal day in the life of The Tandem Tour. We took a day trip down to Seatlle and met the good men at Rodriguez Bicycles, who had been working hard on our Bike.

I picked the boys up at the ferry in the early morning. It was a most sunshiny day, and spirits were at an all time high. After some laughs and general comraderie for the soul, we took off down the mighty highway towards the peace arch crossing into Blaine Worshington.

As we waited in the lineup, we each produced our passports. Everyone gave the a OK until...MILLER!!!! He had an expired passport.

Sweating and jittery, we approached the boarderguard. We told her our cause and what we were doing, and she was the nicest boarderguard ever, and let us right on through to the otherside.

As we made it to R and E bikes, we drove past the shop, and saw the bike through the window. and HOly Crap. We still can't believe how long it is! As we walked into the shop, all of us were dead silent.

it was then that nervouseness set in. Each one us was quietly pondering how the hell we were going to ride this thing across the country.

As Ben Filmed, we each asked Dennis, the builder, any question that was on our mind. As they told us more and more about the bike, we started to realize what an epic trip this is going to be.

The gave us a tour of the shop, and it was unreal. R and E is just a tiny little shop right in Seattle where they make all kinds of custom Bikes. They have a full shop in the basement where all the fabrication is done. Everyone was so nice, and they even took us out for a spin on the new bike, and taught Brent how to Captain the machine.

Basically the man in the front is the Captain of the ship. He controls the braking system, the gear system, and the direction. There are full disc brakes in the front and back, and a drum brake in the back for going down steep hills. They say we will easily be able to reach speeds of over 100Kms and hour. Holy Shit.

There's a movie to come about us picking up the bike at www.thetandemtour.com and will be posting pictures soon. We are pretty darn excited now that this all is happening.