New rider with a clear goal ;)

Introduce Yourself
#1

Hi all,

My name is Mark, I’m from the Netherlands and I’m currently mostly riding street trial (on a bike).
On Instagram I’ve seen another street trial rider also riding a uni pretty well (Pierre Sturny), and I thought it looks cool so I want to start with it as well :wink:
I’ve ordered an Impact Gravity Pro, which means I will be riding the same stuff as I do with my street trial bike.
I love the challenge of learning new stuff, so I’m really looking forward to start on the uni!

As I did with street trial as well, I will be tracking my progress on my Instagram page:

https://www.instagram.com/mark.vogels

Would be awesome to connect there with more uni riders as well :wink:

Cheers,
Mark

4 Likes
#2

Hi Mark. Unicycling is fun. Hoping on stuff is fun. I’m glad to see someone new working toward trials. I hope you like it.

It will be interesting to see if your experience on a trials bike helps with trials unicycling. I would guess that there will be some cross over, especially when it comes to hopping high with the seat out, and maybe also for balance when the unicycle is not moving.

You might be interested in Max Schultz. He does both trials bike and unicycle. He’s a former world champion at unicycle trials, so yeah. He’s not too bad :grinning:

#3

Hello M.V.

If Dutch street trials biking is anything like BMX stunt riding, then you will be riding the unicycle within 1 hr.

I can tell you are serious, because you are not afraid to spend $$$ for one of the best stunt unicycles available. Make sure you buy shin guards.

Keep on.

#4

Practice and more practice you’ll get it if you want to bad enough. I just started learning but hoping to start riding muni.

#5

Thanks, looks awesome! Great motivation to watch his vids!

#6

Welcome to the forum Mark, where abouts do you live in NL? I live in Duiven and often ride on The Veluwe. Im not much into trilals, but can hop a little. Do you have any uni experience yet?

#7

Well, although street trial is a combination of bmx and competition trial, it’s a sport without competitions or rules and therefore completely up to the personal preference of the practitioner.
Personally I love to hop onto things, ride skinny stuff, do fakies and generally improve my overall balance and bike control while having a great time :wink: - Anything which also helps to improve mountainbiking is a pre for me as well.

Most famous street trial rider for you is probably Pierre Sturny, but most famous street trial rider in general is Danny MacAskill. A RedBull rider with over 20 years of experience.
I’ve only started about a year ago, so I still have some months left before I’m at his level :sweat_smile: :rofl: :joy:

But yes, I’m serious with street trial as well, and I’m seeing great resemblence between riding a uni for street / trial and riding a bike for the same stuff. It’ll definitely expand the amazed faces on the street. And maybe people will finally stop asking me if I can do a wheelie :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

As for the shin guards, I usually ride with them on my bikes already, since alu pedals with steel pins are pretty good at leaving their marks on my shins and calves :smiley:

#8

Muni will eventually become one of my interests as well, but first I’ll start with the basic stuff like hopping on and over things :smiley:

1 Like
#9

Between Gorinchem and Breda (a small village called Hank), so not really near Duiven :wink:
No experience at all (started today), so we’ll see how it goes …

#10

There are some basic skills that you will need no matter what you want to do on a unicycle. Everyone starts with learning to ride and then learning to free mount. After that, it’s debatable.

Not everyone will agree, but I would argue that when you are a beginner, any new trick you learn will make you a better rider in all riding styles. For that reason, I think idling and backwards riding are worth spending time to learn. You will not use those skills directly in trials or muni, but you definitely need the steadiness that comes from learning them.

After that, it will be time to specialize, so skills like

  • Seat out riding
  • Still stands
  • Riding skinnies
  • Hopping
  • Rolling hops
  • Seat out hopping

would all make sense.

#11

Cool bike, 24"?
Welcome here, saw you on FB…

#12

I didn’t even consider riding forward, backwards, idling and free mount as basic stuff to start to learn, since there is no way you could do all the other things without them, could you?
Although I did manage to do like 15 consecutive hops already… But it’s pretty useless if you can’t continue your ride afterwards :stuck_out_tongue:

So far I’ve been practicing in my hallway today and I did manage to get forward and backwards through the entire length of the hallway without touching the walls. That’s approx. 2-2.5 revolution of the cranks, so I’m happy with that for now.
Idling is going better as well, trying to feel if it’s better to use half a revolution for rocking back and forth or less than a quarter… both seem to work ok, but especially the half revolution seems to be easier due to the continuous speed of the wheel… Unfortunately my hallway is so small that I can’t fully extend my arms to either side for balans, so I really need to keep a tight posture… But if the weather gets a little better I’ll turn outside tomorrow and see how it goes there :wink:

#13

Thanks! No, 26". I’ve ridden a 24" Fourplay at first, but the Hex (26") feels much more natural to me.
Now i’ve got a 20" Uni, so perhaps in the future I also need one with a bigger wheelsize :wink:

1 Like
#14

A man with a Hex… you must be a fan of Ali Clarkson then…

Good luck with the uni – it will be interesting to hear how transferable you think the skills are.

#15

Yeah, he’s a pretty good rider. Tbh I think in various moves he’s even better than his buddy Danny. :wink:

As for transferability of skills, I think the most transferable skill will be falling :stuck_out_tongue_winking_eye:

#16

Falling is maybe one of the most useful skills you can have, so that will be stand you in good stead for sure. That and the perseverance you’ll have developed.

Since you like Mr MacAskill’s antics, and his “Way Back Home” video is now 10 years old (!), here are a couple of locations with a unicycle that you may recognise from that and “The Ridge”. Suffice to say I didn’t go up on the Cullin ridge with my 29"er:

https://unicyclist.com/t/danny-macaskill/127597

1 Like
#17

Hi Mark, Klaas here, unicyclist in Ede. I don’t know about ‘street trials’, but I guess you mean what is commonly called street. There sure are competitions in that discipline! Roos Seegers runs a small unicycling club in Alphen (Noord-Brabant) specialising in street and trials. She is an awesome rider, and so is Stan from her club. Since you are also in Brabant, you should certainly contact her!

#18

Hi Klaas,

Thanks for the info!
Roos has already given me lots of useful tips :wink:
And Street trial is a biking sport, on 2 wheels. I’ve been practicing it for the last year but I do understand the confusion since the same terms are used in unicycling as well…
What kind of uni/style do you ride?

#19

After 2 days of practicing in the hallway, I finally could go outside today.
The unassisted mounting looks clumsy and I feel like I’m cheating with the hops, but hey, I got on there :stuck_out_tongue:

For the rest it’s really fun to do, and pretty exhausting for my upper legs as well :smiley:

Here are some clips from todays practice. All tips and pointers are very welcome!

https://www.instagram.com/p/CITDZn2H-sY/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link

1 Like
#20

In the warmer season I do road riding/racing and track racing. In the winter I focus on muni, I find it too cold for road or track, and most competitions are in the summer season anyway.