Learning on a hill

Riding Advice
1

Hi again! I don’t know where to put this so I’m starting a new thread.

Okay, where I live there is literally nothing but (very steep) hill for about half a mile. The valley where it is flat is has a bike/walk path with lots of people on it, and a muddy stretch of creek bed. There is one road by the bike path but it is busy.

I learned how to ride in our (mostly) flat driveway, but I got a bad habit of leaning to the right to compensate for the hill. :stuck_out_tongue: I can now ride up and down these hills, and turn, just fine. I also corrected the leaning, so I can ride on the walking path quite safely.

I learned how to freemount inside of our garage, and I’ve practiced idling in there (my idling is NOT coming along). I’ve also jumproped out in the middle of the hilly road and gotten several UPDs from that.

My problem is that I really want to learn backwards riding. I’m not a person to take much of a risk (hello, extra hours of practice and all the pads!). I suppose I can just wake up EARLY in the morning and practice along the little straight stretch of the walking path before all the morning joggers get up. :stuck_out_tongue: Or start in the garage/driveway, the whole twenty feet I get there.

Offbeat chance any of you have any suggestions?

2

Learning to ride backwards is a lot like learning to ride forwards - a lot of repetitive attempts and not getting very far at first. I actually made most of my initial progress in my garage.

3

Backwards riding definitely feels a lot more dangerous, but as long as you don’t try to go too fast you should be ok.

One thing that will help you avoid injury is learning to fall backwards. I didn’t find any really good videos on the skill, but this one should give you the basic idea:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSZoRg3wp8E

Just practice your backwards falling, and you should feel much more confident during your riding.

4

Ride forward until you get to a safe, flat place to practice. In the beginning, riding backward will not be happening in a straight line, so give yourself some space. Are there any flat parking lots within a mile or so? A one-mile ride should make for a good warm up! :slight_smile: