Hi everyone,
Have just discovered the world of unicycling after being intruiged by it for many years. Having spent many hours BMXing and skateboarding as a teenager, it’s great to see how the internet can enhance learning with the all the support and sharing or knowledge. Have got my son a unicycle for Xmas, and could not resist getting one for myself to learn. Looking forward to reading more of the old posts, and following further developments from you all.
Welcome!
Welcome, Unity!
Welcome to the uni-forums and to unicycling. Started back in 2012 but this year I’m returning after a 3 year gap. Don’t know why I ever stopped, it’s such fun and so good for you.
Learning to ride is a big challenge, however I have personally found re-learning skills I used to have even harder (as I’d compare my present self to my former uni-self)
Anyway— Welcome!
Hey,
Thanks very much, much appreciated. It’s coming together slowly. It is a good workout, was suprised to get a bit of a sweat on even though there is minimal distance being traveled. I consider myself fit from cycling but this uses different muscles, much more of the core and is handy to be able to have a work out in a carpark away from traffic during the winter months.
How far did you get with your riding before your break? And, how are you finding the skills coming back?
Yes it certainly does get a sweat on! I don’t think that changes but you do get more efficient as you develop.
I stopped riding around 2017ish due to a frozen shoulder and general chaos in my working situation then. But I was pretty confident in riding and was doing solo 15 mile stretches on my 36er (no great shakes by others on this forum standard, but still…)
It’s taken me a good few months to feel like I could do 15 milers again now - but even now my riding is more focused on little and often to keep the body focused rather than doing a huge ride and then stopping again.
The fitness side of unicycling means if you drop out for a bit you can’t simple jump back in like you would with cycling.
Anyway, definitely keep at it and the rewards will come once muscle memory start storing the skill and you can riding (kind of) without thinking on easy paths etc.
Oh and don’t take a break from it 
(like wot I’d gone and did!)
Wow, 15miles - that’s very cool!! I’m measuring in centimeters at the moment lol! How long did it take you to get the basics, like being able to make it across the length of a carpark?
How does the long distance uni differ to cycling then, alot more intensive on the thighs because it is more upright and as no gears?
Well done for getting back into it, sure it will soon improve if you keep at it. Little and often is great!
Welcome. I’m also just beginning. It’s a great time learning though. I’m 57 but I’ve always done action sports like mogul skiing, windsurfing, aggressive inline skating and slackline. It took me about 4 -5 hours to travel 50 meters. 7 hours to do 100 meters consistently. You just got to push through those first 2-3 hours where nothing seems to work, and then all of a sudden you do a couple of revs. It grows quickly once you are able to do that. Just keep at it.
Great stuff, that’s inspiring to read that you’re learning at 57 - you got to keep going in life haven’t you! Sure the background of the other sports with be helpful. SOunds like you have pretty much cracked it.
It’s great learning, starting to realise that the little falls and knocks don’t kill you and it’s a case of visualizing success having confidence and courage, rather than tension and trepidation. It is coming along, and very satisfying to see the developments having started and barely been able to sit on the saddle holding on to two walls! All about the practice, could do one hour per day but two hours means double the progress
I think my actual learning to ride took me a week - but I was able to fully focus on to 100% and I starting using the long hall way in the place I was living at the time which helped. Then it was trial and error.
Best tip I remember in a video on the skill was:
Vary Your Mistakes
So if you find you keep falling off to the left, deliberately try and fall to the right. If hunching forwards, just stretching in the other direction. Etc etc.
It really is the key to unicycling in my view and in fact any skill learning process. Repeating the same approach to the “problem” might have you solving it eventually. But if you deliberately focus on doing a variety of “mistakes” you force your body to react and you speed up the process of failing and adjusting.
One you can ride the stamina side picks up pretty quickly and when 10 meters would have me in a pant and sweat - in a few weeks that was a walk / roll in the park. And then comes a flat ride mile being easy and so on and so on.
I’m truth I prefer larger wheels as the ride is smoother and you glide (when confident) - and while scary for the start of it, the reality is you can feel somewhat safe on a 36er and the cruise is just hard to beat. The body takes over a good chunk of the actual cognative load of riding and then you focus your energies or other challenges to the skill to unicycling.
Riding becomes “easy” but The Art of Unicycling is ALWAYS challenging.
Why I’m pushing myself to learn to ride a geared wheel. Push your self.
As Kris Holm says: “If you’re not falling, you’re probably not trying!”
My profile has a link to my YouTube channel and you’ll see my learning stages from ages back and more recent stuff.
Thanks, there’s lots of good analogies and life lessons from unicycling. It makes sense to vary things up too so not to get into bad habits, of this is what happens when I try and do this…
Cool video’s on the YT channel.
A week is good going to get the basics of riding, will be happy with that - trying to do 2hours per day practice but I guess better not to put an expectation on it or bring in comparisons…
How can one be intrigued by something one hasn’t discovered yet?
An awareness vs insight I guess… Useful to read your history of development on your website and nice Uni photos.
Ah thanks. It hasn’t been updated in a looooong time though.
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