Still struggling with the Free-Mount. 
Have put in about 3 hours dedicated practice and am able to mount 50% at best.
Sticking to it though as I realize mastering the Free-Mount really opens up unicycling!
Cheers 
Simon
Hi Scoope,
I started practicing free mounts today, after two weeks of work on riding a unicycle. I got perhaps 6 clean free mounts in an hour, so 50% sounds great. How long have you been working on it? Do you have any pointers?
Good luck Simon. Free mounting is worth it. I got sick of hearing āOh, you use a wallā¦ā when I used to use a wall to start.
Scott - This is what Iām doing!
Iām sure you have your dominant foot on one pedal - do not put any weight on that pedal as you push off the ground with your other foot. One thing thing that seemed to help me is making sure that you are leaning forward just before you kick off the ground to make the mount.
This seems to help keep the momentum moving forward and helps you start off. Also keeping the whole motion as slow and controlled as you can helps too (obviously control is the hard part with us beginners :p).
I have experimented with holding the seat handle throughout the mount process and not holding the handle. i think not holding the handle suits me best but I have read that others prefer to hold the handle whilst mounting.
Iāve been practicing for about 3 hours spread over 2-3 weeks as I only get to ride at weekends these days.
Iām heading out for more practice now.
Good luck with your free mounting
Cheers
Simon
When I started to learn to ride my practice area was the street outside my house and there were no walls or anything to hold onto, and had to learn how to freemount even before I could ride 30 meters. My method was quite simple and basically involved holding onto the wheel with 1 hand while stepping up. If you do put to much pressure on your back (mounting) pedal, your hand counter acts the pressure and keeps the wheel in place allowing you to step up onto the other pedal and then start riding.
Itās not the most elegant ways of mounting and to the layman watching theyāll probably think that youāre going to face-plant on the stepping up, but itās quite easy and safe as long as you let go of the wheel before trying to pedal to hard. Once you get the feel of the pressure you need to apply on the back pedal to keep the unicycle in place it just gets easier.
Itās not the only method to learn how to freemount, but itās what worked for me.
Good luck
You can also try to use a curb. Place the wheel, with the cranks in the right position, in front of the curb and try to mount. In the beginning the curb will stop the wheel from rolling back when you put too much pressure on the pedal, and itās also easier to get on (as you donāt have to ājumpā upp as much when you stand on the curb.)
Try to put less and less pressure on the pedal. When you feel comfortable doing this, move the wheel away from the curb (Iām talking about maybe ~1 dm) and try to mount - without hitting the curb with your wheel. Once youāve mastered this, freemounting from the ground should be really easy.
Well I sucked today at practice, 20%-30% success rate - when I did manage a mount my foot was so badly placed on the pedal that riding was difficult and if I tried to reposition my foot I ended with an UPD.
More practice next weekend
Thanks to all for the suggestions and support!
Cheers
Simon
Try the tip I gave in this video. Itās at 2:50 in. I recently and successfully used this method to teach two new riders to free mount within 15 minutes! I demonstrate it on a 36er, but it can be applied to any size uni:
Terry,
when you taught the new riders to free mount, did you get them to practice with the blocks first and then move onto the uni?
I have several unis, all of which I can free mount using the roll back, but I need to learn to static mount. would you suggest I start with the 16 and work my way up, 26 - 29 - 36, or strat with the one I ride the most which is my 26 muni.
I am still having problems freemounting the Coker (these for 5 years!).
there are different reasons: one is once I am correctly positioned I am unable to get it rolling ā¦I need to apply strong force on the front pedal and for this I must stand on the front pedal and have the pedal slightly higher than horizontal ā¦
otherwise the beast does not start to roll (unless I freemount on a descent)
In your video terry I see that your front pedal is horizontal (or even below horizontal) when you start rolling . so why do I fail?
I found this old video from Andrew Carter priceless when learning to static mount. Taken from http://www.unicycletips.com/
http://www.unicyclist.com/index.php?page=gallery&g2_view=core.ShowItem&g2_itemId=129483
A while ago I also did a mini video on 36 static mounting. Well static mount with a slight hop/foot adjustment for some friends. Itās at http://www.norry.co.uk/temp/36mount.wmv 23meg wmv
What length cranks are you using? I usually use 145s on my coker and find it easy to get going from a static mount on these, but with 125s I find it much more difficult. Most people seem to do some variation of a rolling/walking mount on a coker with short cranks.
FWIW, I actually find it easier to static mount a bigger wheel, because you can get away with more weight on the pedal before the wheel rolls back. With a tiny wheel itās almost like doing a jump mount.
Rob
A normal roll back mount is actually pretty hard as you have to change direction. When I was learning (quite a while back) I could jump mount much more consistantly. You land on the unicycle with your feet in the right position to ride off.
using 140 (I gave up 125 for this very reason). But I really would like to understand how people get the beast rolling ā¦ wether using static mount , rolling or grabbing the tire I just end up with the same problem: I must stand up to counter balance the inertia and start rolling ā¦ so I miss often (3 weeks ago I had a bout of psy blocking and had to try 30 times before starting, yesterday I just missed twoā¦ go figureā¦) I nearly always miss if Coker is facing up the slope.
I, similarly, have been trying for years to freemount the 36" beasty beauty. However I think my problem is different from yours. Because I am so short and have to jump up onto the uni, the woomph of landing (probably not the technical term) overcomes the intertia and starts my baby rolling. However, because I have to jump up, I find getting my balance very difficult.
Even on my 29" w/125s, I have much more success with the āstatic rolling mountā than with the standard half-rev-back-then-go-forward static mount, partially because of the momentum assistance, and I suspect partially because the height difference between standing and riding is a bit greater (than with a 20").
Excellent termā¦ love it. Rekon I may start using it 
a young lady of 16 in our group just started with a āsuicide mountā and got the beast rolling (I am disgusted: young ones are so gifted!).