Our Marriage is Like Riding a Tandem Bike. Literally.

Few things look as romantic as riding a tandem cycle with your partner. Jaunting through parks on breezy mornings and with a song on the lips, the tandem — cycle with two seats — has been long positioned as a vehicle for courtship in films and photos. But do you know the tandem is also dubbed as a “divorce machine”?

The Internet is awash with stories of how tandem cycling can either make or break relationships. The premise, as cited in these blogs, is simple: The cyclist couple needs to work as a team. If the back rider (called the stoker) doesn’t trust the instructions of the front rider (or the captain) the journey would be full of hiccups. It's the ultimate test of a relationship, some say.

Gladly, for Sanat Rath, a software engineer, and Pramita Mishra, a physics lecturer, they seem to be in tandem. Or how else would have they become the first Indian couple to ride 200km in 12 hours and 7 minutes on a fat tandem bike? They achieved the feat last December by riding till the Kolar Gold Fields in the south Indian state of Karnataka and beat their own record by pedalling 300km a month later. Now the duo in their mid-30s is prepping for an endurance ride, called brevet in the cycling world, of 600km.

They have been double cycling for almost as long as they have been married – three years. And their home on the third floor of an apartment in Yeshwanthpur, a locality in the south Indian city of Bengaluru, is a testament of the exciting adventure their life is. The nameplate on the door reads “The Tandem Couple”, a moniker they have earned. Cycles, which they have nine of, hang on the walls, lie side by side in a room dedicated to the collection and even in the parking lot. Cycle motifs can be found on the alarm clock, a showpiece, a scroll painting and a jute bag too.

Listen and let go

Rath credits their success as the tandem duo to their tuning. “I had once gone tandem cycling with a colleague,” he tells VICE. “Since I was the captain, I was telling him to do this and that. He didn’t take it well and asked me instead, ‘Am I a kid or what? Why are you giving me instructions?’ But when Pramita took up tandem as a stoker, she listened to my instructions and trusted me from Day 1.”

It was in May 2018, a few months after they’d tied the knot in an arranged marriage, when they first hit the road on a non-geared tandem. They then moved to a geared tandem with normal tyres and got one with fatter tyres during the pandemic. 

“The fat tyres make the cycle heavier, weighing up to 28kg, and cycling tougher. And we like new challenges,” Rath explains the unusual choice. Fat tandems are a rarity in India and are sold only by a store in Delhi, informs the couple. They cost Rs 27,000 (approx $362), only a tad costlier than the normal tandems that come for Rs 25,000. The latter is easier to find, available in major cycle stores in cities. 

Once the pair got the fat tandem, they set some rules. They would hop on the saddle on the count of three and start pedalling with their right foot. Rath would shout “apply brake” when the need arose or say “false” to change to a lower gear. If they were zipping past noisy areas, these codes were repeated twice. And like that, they clocked 30km on Day 1 smoothly, riding between their old home and their relative's in Bengaluru.

Today, the need for coded communication has come down as they have logged more than 3,000km, going up till the Tamil Nadu border, which is 50km away from their home. “Now we can read each other's mind. For instance, if I feel some resistance on the pedal, I know he is negotiating an obstacle,” says Mishra.

She had no ego issues taking the back seat on the tandem — as a co-rider, a partner or a woman. “He had been cycling for 20 years,” she explains. “As for my experience, I used to cycle 20km up and down to my college. That's it. So it made sense to listen to somebody who was experienced and confident.”

She admits just as frankly that coming from a smaller city like Rourkela in Odisha, she found the idea of cycling in traffic-ridden Bengaluru scary. But tandem allowed her the captainship of Rath at all times and built her road confidence gradually. Today, she feels she is ready to graduate from a stoker to a captain. Rath says he has no hang-ups about becoming a pillion rider as long as the swap doesn’t compromise their safety on the road.

Of course, going pillion has its perks too. Mishra, who has been there and done that, shares, “The captain has to concentrate all the time, navigating the road, negotiating turns and whatnot. Whereas, the stoker has the time to look left and right, wave at people, smile for cameras and even take questions from bikers such as ‘Where did you get this cycle from?’.”

Two driven individuals, one happy marriage

Given that they are into long-distance cycling, where every minute matters and where ice cream and cold drink cravings have to wait for another day, do they see the tandem as a vehicle for romance? Rath takes this question with a wide grin: “It's true that we mostly ride in silence and we talk once in 15 or 20 minutes. But there is togetherness in silence as well.”

Mishra jumps in to add, “In fact, I think a couple gets to talk more on a tandem as compared to when they are riding separately and side by side.” In the latter, you tend to turn your head and talk. This can cause you to lose the balance of the cycle and lose sight of the hurdle in front.

Once in a while, however, they do act like average couples. “We go for leisure rides in the parks, you know, to look at trees and birds. And talk of things like 'I have marinated fish for lunch',” she laughs out loud.

Do they feel their tuning as cyclists has made their marriage better? The question draws blank looks from both but Mishra comes around to answer it first: “We have never thought about this but our life since marriage has been about planning one cycle ride to another, executing it, reviewing it and setting new goals. That leaves us no time to have differences, which may happen with other couples.”

It keeps them active, healthy and driven, and these, for Rath, are important to bring out the best in each other. His thought is in step with what relationship experts often say, loving yourself first improves your relationship.

Mishra knows that well. “I always wanted to cycle for 200km but if I set out solo, it might have taken me longer to meet the target as it's difficult to keep oneself motivated. But by riding with Sanat, I make half the effort and achieve double the goals.” She has become headstrong too, she says. “The first time we went tandem till the Nandi Hills (61km away from Bengaluru), I complained about the heat, about getting tired. But next time, I did the same route and didn’t complain.”

Though Rath is a seasoned cyclist, he now prefers going tandem over solo. He says jocularly, “If not for Pramita, I could not have shared the pride of being the first Indian 'couple' to do 200km on a fat tandem.” Actually, he owes more to his wife, which she tells us laughingly, “We met on a matrimonial website. I was impressed with his photos. He was posing on a fat cycle in one photo and a tandem in another. This guy is interesting, I had thought.”

Reflecting on their tandem journey and the questions it has raised such as 'How can you listen to your husband all the time on the tandem (sic)?', Mishra feels there is fun in letting go. Or, as Rath sees it, “There is no winner or loser between us. We win together, we lose together.” Obviously, it takes two to tandem.

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