I’m learning backwards riding by doing an extension of idling. For example, I’ll ride forward, come to a stop left foot down, ride back a half-cycle until my right foot is down, then ride forward a half-cycle until my left is down again, then repeat the process. Or I’ll ride back a full-cycle instead, so that my left foot is down again, and repeat that. Or, again, I’ll do the same with three half-cycles. Like idling but stretched-out horizontally.
My question is, is there a name for this type of extended idling?
If not, I propose a bookish term: “n-idling”, where n is the number of half-cycles involved. So normal idling, where there are no half-cycles involved, would be “0-idling”. My first example above is “1-idling”, and so on.
You see that odd numbers always involve a change of foot for the direction change.
What you are calling a 1-idle I call a super-idle. But I don’t think super-idle is a common term. I never got around to trying to name what you call a 2-idle or 3-idle, but I like those terms. It scales well and makes sense. And best of all it it is 0 based (starts counting at 0 instead of 1). I like the ‘C’ style programming languages that start counting at 0 so that counting method makes perfect sense to me.
To carry this further, we can call a still stand a null idle.
I learned to ride backwards using the same method you are using. It worked well for me. I like that method because it teaches you how to stop and recover without falling or loosing control. I never had a bad fall while learning to ride backwards. Now I just gotta learn how to turn and ride in a circle while riding backwards.
Same way I learned to ride backward. After a couple days of just trying to ride backward, I wasn’t having much fun- so I incorperated it as an add-on to all the other skills practiced. Controll your speed and you’ll have an easyer time of it. I developed a distinctive snake path riding backward; this is becoming straighter as I grow comfortable.
Once I was comfortable riding and looking backward (well, really sideways and kinda down) riding to the left or right was much easeyer. Still, I’m not where I wana be with this skill- occasionaly I’ll do short sections of trail, and riding with Lewis and Tommy in Memphis I managed a 180 hop to riding backward while maintaining direction. That was all brovado, and no skill- I just imagined I was watching somebody do it and didn’t actualy think about it all that much- I hope wheel walking is the same way
Cool – “null idle” sounds great. And, then, by extension, we have the idles that you practice in your mind , when you are supposed to be paying attention in a meeting or in class…they are “imaginary idles”, the so-called 1i-idle, 2i-idle, etc.
If you are idling in reality and not really paying attention, you can get off into Euclidean never-never land by doing a 3-idle while imagining you are doing a 8-idle (very tricky I suppose). That would be a (3+8i)-idle.
More to say later about idle spectral analysis, short-term memory, and the effects of resource limitations on basis set dimension…
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>Folks –
>
>I’m learning backwards riding by doing an extension of idling. For
>example, I’ll ride forward, come to a stop left foot down, ride back a
>half-cycle until my right foot is down, then ride forward a half-cycle
>until my left is down again, then repeat the process. Or I’ll ride back
>a full-cycle instead, so that my left foot is down again, and repeat
>that. Or, again, I’ll do the same with three half-cycles. Like idling
>but stretched-out horizontally.
>
>My question is, is there a name for this type of extended idling?
>
>If not, I propose a bookish term: “n-idling”, where n is the number of
>half-cycles involved. So normal idling, where there are no half-cycles
>involved, would be “0-idling”. My first example above is “1-idling”,
>and so on.
I am not completely sure about your terminology. In my view, in normal
idling there ARE half-cycles involved. Also, normally the stops are
with cranks horizontal, not vertical. A normal idle oscillates a half
revolution. Your first example also seems to do that, but you’re
talking about which foot is down (as opposed to forward) at the
extreme ends. I would call the normal idle a 1-idle, and (to satisfy
John Childs) a standstill would indeed be a 0-idle and equivalent to a
null-idle.
BTW, I am trying to learn to ride backwards by exactly the same
method. It started naturally; at a certain moment when I stopped the
half revolution backwards I wasn’t “falling forward” but still
backwards. Intuitively I made another half turn and recovered. I
haven’t done three yet but I keep practicing. Also my idling (normal
1-idling I mean) is not yet what it should be.
Klaas Bil
“To trigger/fool/saturate/overload Echelon, the following has been picked automagically from a database:”
“BRLO, GEODSS, Fox”
Normally in basic idling one rocks back and forth with the same foot down (say the left); it stays down except for the oscillations about the down position. This is what I call 0-idling because the idle has no “length” – it stays in the same place on the ground.
If you roll back far enough so that your right foot goes into the down position and you use your right foot to start going forward again, you have effectively switched idling feet temporarily. Since this is one-half of a complete revolution back from the original idling position, which had the left foot down, the idle “length” is one half-cycle. This is what I call 1-idling. It is essentially one half-cycle long horizontally, and involves switching back and forth between left and right foot during each change in direction.
An idle that is a full revolution long is 2-idling because it is two half-cycles in length.
Does that help at all? I’m not looking for agreement, but more of understanding of what I am proposing.
Remember that a regular 0-idle doesn’t require one to go back and forth a full half-cycle; you could idle just a few degrees forward and back of the down position.
A still-stand is just a 0-idle with no oscillations; this justifies the additional merit of the term “null”. However, a still stand is more accurately a “null circus idle” because the cranks are in the horizontal position. A straight “null idle” would be a still stand with one foot in the down position.
BTW it’s cool that your backwards is going well, Klaas and Rhysling. I’m trying to get one foot to leave the pedal for a while, to do one-foot 0-idling but so far all the limbs complain vigorously!
Perhaps we can develop a cryptic code like the jugglers have: 1f3i(l) could be one foot 3-idling (left)
>Does that help at all? I’m not looking for agreement, but more of
>understanding of what I am proposing.
It did help. You define the length of “multiple” idlings by the number
of half-revolutions between the equilibrium points, not between the
extremes. I was just assuming that the amplitude of the oscillation in
“normal” idlings (your 0-idling) is one-half revolution, which is at
least how I think I idle. Therefore the term “1-idle” would be more
natural to me.
Klaas Bil
“To trigger/fool/saturate/overload Echelon, the following has been picked automagically from a database:”
“NSDD, furby, JICA”
Ha ha caught me. But from what I’ve seen of unicycling so far, I doubt that it’s impossible! If people can hop no-handed on an ultimate (see One Wheel No Limit), I’m sure someone can execute a 1f3i(l).
