Jacobi's Tandem

Some of you might remember back in November our post from Ryan and Jacobi on their Iceman experience. For this weeks '...because we ride' post we have their Iceman Tandem rig. Jacobi was kind enough to do a nice little write up on the one race this bike competed in:

So this was going to be the year I get my wife out and do the Iceman Cometh Mountain Bike Rice. It's a 28 mile point-to-point race in northern Michigan. It's a lot of fun and a great place to see old friends and meet new ones.

Well, it didn't work out with my wifes work schedule. So I hired a surefire animal to be my stoker. Ryan Olthouse a.k.a. the bear. He is a short guy not much taller than myself but boy does he pack a punch. Out of the gate we were in the thick of a heated battle between 1-5 place. There were a total of 25 tandems racing that day and we were out for blood.

About 10 minutes into the race we were in second place behind Dan 'The Man' Janson and his wife, Tara. They were more focused on training than us, considering they have been riding the tandem all summer; compared to Ryan and I only squeaked out 5 good rides on the thing. Just as we thought we had a clear shot at second place here came Matt Gaffner pulling up on our rear. We battled with him for about an hour, pulling away at the end to take secure second place by a mere 30 seconds. Hats off to you Matt.

We finished strong and vowed to never do that again! It was a hell of a race. My Cannondale held up flawlessly and here is a rundown on my Cannondale Street Tandem Highly Modified:

Big Shock
Big Breaks
X9 Shifter
X9 Deraileur setup 1x9 [I custom made bash guard plates to guide the connector cranks so we wouldn't throw the chain]
Custom Velocity 20mm Blunt Front wheel
Custom Velocity Aeroheat 40H tandem disc in the rear.

*Every part was scrutinized for weight [~37 lbs race day] and comfort
Foam Stoker grips, oh yeah!