1 foot ww ---> gliding...how do you keep your speed up?

Riding Advice
1

I am decent at 1 ft ww and ready to learn gliding, but I am running into some problems.

To begin 1 ft ww, I pedal until my right foot is in the 12oclock position and my left foot is in the 6oclock position. Then, I bring my right foot up onto the tire. Last, I bring my left foot onto the frame. The first move I make with my right foot is pushing the wheel forward. To glide, I need to get up a lot of speed before the top of the hill. However, I can’t seem to find a way to get my left foot on the frame when the first move I make with my right foot is dragging on the tire, not pushing it. What suggestions do you have for getting into the “glide position” while keeping my speed up? I want to know if you take your right foot off the pedal first or your left foot. Hope this all made some sense.

-grant

2

first off, find a slope, it will make your life easier.

here’s how i learned gliding from 1ft wheel walk. it felt like i was learning it on phases- these phases were

  1. 1 foot wheel walking quickly and occasionally gliding to a stop using LOTS of foot pressure, and only going 2 feet. before falling off the front.
  2. using less foot pressure and not being able to keep balanced, and falling off the back.
  3. able to balance with lighter foot pressure, going further and further with each attempt
  4. able to glide. leaning forward, use less pressure, go faster. when leaning backward, use more pressure, slow down. vary those two for extended glides. i’ve been able to glide for about 3 weeks now, so don’t take me too seriously. it’s like anything else… practice relentlessly and you’ll get it. if you don’t, you wont. for me, learning gliding was about 4 times more frustruating than learning 1ft wheel walking.
3

I have 2 ways of getting into glide

method 1:

  1. Ride along as fast as i can (this only comes with practise start slowly).
  2. Take gliding foot off first when its closest to the wheel
  3. Frame foot goes onto frame
  4. Glide away.

It takes a fraction of a second to do this, the gap between the feet coming off pedals is almost nothing.

method 2:

  1. Ride 1ft really fast with the frame foot overlapping onto the tyre
  2. Take foot off pedal.
  3. Other foot goes onto frame or hangs out back depending on whether i’m leg extended.
  4. Glide out

This is gliding with the foot on the frame overlapping onto the tyre. This may seem harder but its better for gliding on flatland. The transition is much easier as well. Once you get good at this you’ll find the foot only touches tyre when it needs to - good build up to coasting.

What ever works for you. People do it either way.

4

I assume most people have their gliding foot the same foot as they prefer to one foot ww with right?

5

Sorry if I’m repeating what someone else already wrote.

I ride one-foot to get going. My non-pedaling foot is already on the frame. Then when the pedaling foot gets to the top I lift it up onto the tire. That gets you started with speed.

Many people just pop both feet off the pedals at once. One goes to the tire while the other goes to the frame. Though I can do this method, I’m not as comfortable with it as with the way I learned so many years ago.

How to keep up your speed once gliding? Don’t press down on the tire so hard. You should be able to keep going with minimal slope. The easiest way to spot a “beginning” glider is to see how steep a slope they want to do it on. “Just right” for a beginner is way too steep for me.

6

If you can’t glide already, then find a hill with a fence or something going down it. Or with a post at the top. Then mount into the glide position holding the fencepostthing, and just start gliding down. Don’t worry about riding into it yet.

7

When I wanted to learn gliding everybody adviced me to find a hill.
But things worked out much better when I returned to the flat basketbal field, where I always 'vbeen practising, before trieng that hill.