How to slow myself down?

You could also try going out for a hard ride just before and pick her up for your cooldown ride.

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You can absolutely work on fitness while riding an ebike. Often the weaker will be leading the stronger from what I’ve seen of my friend couples who are in a similar situation.

Actually since people assume so much…one is a male who needs the ebike to keep up with his female wife. No egos. No BS. They both get a great workout and can do it mostly together.

Only making the initial suggestion as I’ve seen more couple be able to ride together more with one on the ebike.

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Never tried one of these (or even knownif they still exist) but I remember this post and it sounds like it can solve your problem by increasing the resistance on your wheel hub:

I know several pros who use the AIRhub https://airhub.com.au/ for when they are out riding with their girlfriends.

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Yes! but…

as a person who’s SO has a full 1 watt/KG over them, that isn’t always viable. Drafting is a skill. I live in a windy region and I still struggle to keep myself out of the wind, or if I’m in a bigger group, keep myself from being guttered/on the yellow line. And forget when we hit a hill! It’s kind of comical how much time I spend in tempo just trying to stay in his or our friends’ draft.

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I’m the partner in this scenario :slight_smile:

I think you have some good options! For reference in my case, my SO is 4.5 w/kg, I’m 3.5. We both like longer road rides (4+ hours) with plenty of climbing (5k-8k ft) which we get to do with friends weekly almost all year round.

We’d had success when I ride my roadie and he brings his CX bike with knobby tires. Or he’s brought his light, fast MTB while I’m on my gravel bike. He’s fantasied a bit about getting a heavy touring bike where he could carry extra stuff and I like the idea of being able to keep up better. But he just wants a party bike, hahaha.

For is, our dynamic was established pretty early. He rides ahead, turns back, and turns around when he sees me. He also likes cafe stops, so sometimes we plan to meet at the cafe so he’ll have his coffee and pastry in hand. After having a little experience riding with slower people, I understand that it’s not fun and downright uncomfortable to ride slowly. So I don’t take offence. I always have the route uploaded and running on my head unit, which relieves a lot of stress for both of us.

Another thing that has helped a lot is having a power meter. I look down and think “well, this is what I can do for 4 hours, I’m not going to get upset about not keeping up”. It’s a nice ego-soother. Oh, and using Trainer Road! After a couple months of training, I was able to hold my SO’s wheel for much longer.

I’ve encouraged my SO to bring a heavier bike, but he’d rather ride ahead and wait. Doesn’t sound like it’s an issue for you guys, but I think it’s important to know each other’s expectations and go from there. Keeping up with my SO stresses me out sometimes, and I’ll feel relieved when he disappears ahead of me. I’m pretty happy riding myself, but that’s not fun for everyone.

An ebike could be a solution, but it sounds like your partner is not far off from you and might only need a couple watts that could be gained with increased drafting skill, bike choice, tire choice, etc. E bikes are wildly expensive- a set of gatorskins for you and Grand Prix 5000 for her is a lot cheaper and sounds more fun to me!

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Yes I have, another tip I forgot about is to just go ahead and then back again and meet up (especially fun in the mountains :wink: )

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I would definitely consider an e-bike. She can use it to assist as much or as little as she wants so she can do the same work as she was before and you don’t have to ease up. Seems like win win to me. Not to mention, it may open the door to faster group rides for her or longer distances…

Not to mention rather than pushing to keep up she could throw it into turbo and rip his legs off that uphill. And that’s a lot more fun. :smile: