Riding along comfortably under canopy provided by oaks and sweet gum trees listening to buzzing insects, singing birds, scampering squirrels, rooting armadillos and the hum of my Coker. Then pop, pop, pop… could that be… gunfire? Though you can see nothing through the thick trees, signs confirm it.
It’s an eerie feeling to ride along past this area on a uni; made me feel like a metal duck in a carnival shooting gallery. A mile or so down the trail is Camp Milton. A civil war camp used by the Confederate Army in the spring and summer of 1864. Biting insects, sweltering heat, and sounds of continuous gunfire brought my imagination alive around the campfire (white dome) site used 145 years ago.
an other training-ride for the 24hour race on zhe weekend of the 26 of june. this time with marc (on the pics). we did a 1400meter (verticalmeter) climb onroad and downhill we had all the way down a great singletrack
The other day one guy I know who is doing road cycling suggested me to join a little event he was organizing with other people from the company we are both working in.
The event consists in doing the ascent of the famous sloppy road up to l’Alpe d’Huez (in the French Alps) - and it was the 3rd edition of it.
I said to him “Why not?” but reminded him that I was a unicyclist and that I would try to climb on one wheel. Of course he was pretty amused and impressed altogether!
During the few last weeks, I built a road-centric wheel to equip my KH’29 offroad unicycle - and I moved my T7 handle from my 36er (which got the new touring handle from KHU) to my KH’29, in order to help me as much as possible during this difficult ascent.
Well… the D day arrived - it was last Friday afternoon, and I am pretty happy to have been successful in making it, even though I had to stop a few times to allow my legs recovering a little bit.
Next year I will try to climb without stopping at all: I will try to be in better shape, will start the ascent when the sun will start declining a little (it was HOT last week!!!), will not start my ride from the foot of the mountain but rather a few miles away in order to “heat” the muscles a little bit before starting to climb, etc.
Next year I’ll also try to mount an offroad tire once at the top, in order to do the way down offroad rather than on the road.
This was cool anyway - a lot of nice comments from the people I met, and the nature around is sooooooooooo nice => this was really “fueling” my mind during the ascent!
Anybody reading this who has done this great ascent on a unicycle already?
I was in century city the other day- cool place to ride…got yelled at for riding in the back of this building, then went to do this staircase in front. I had never even ridden off a curb or a stair before, so I was pretty proud that after a little practice, I did the whole staircase:) This probably sounds lame to you more experienced peoples, but today I got 10 bunny hops in a row:) and I got a good 8in (estimate) hop as my highest.
Yesterday I went for another longish ride on the geared 26. Loads of fun! I think I got used to the new seat by now.
If you look closely you will see the ripe blueberries in the first and second picture. Queen Beatrix didn’t seem too impressed with my one wheeled contraption, but at least she didn’t object to posing with it for a picture or two…
Quinn’s “real muni” debut! Up on South Table Mountain outside of Denver. He is rockin’ it! He had nasty fall into some brush that tore up his ear…but what great muni adventure doesn’t involve a little blood? OUCH!! At seven years old, the KH 20" just fits him. He is really gaining in confidence and motivation. Even after the ear injury he says he wants to muni every day! Hooray for me and my new Muni Buddy!
Quinn has been bitten by the MUni-bug! He looks like he loving it and he’s even starting out with a great uni! Sorry about his ear mishap, but yeah, it comes with the territory, but he looks well protected which is good.
Ouch, that must have hurt. Who would have thought of the possibility to injure one’s ears while muniing? I’m glad it didn’t discourage him, though. You must be proud.
A nice ride through Chicksands woods today, even tried my first bit of Northshore (very tame I know but it scared the hell out of me!! - got to start somewhere I guess)
today we did an other training ride for the 24h race next weekend (lap: 7km and 200altimeter up-and downhill).
we did a 900altimeter climb onroad and took the singletrail down.
my goal was doing the uphill under an hour, which i made (56 minutes)
i rode turtle’s V with the racing ralph 2.4 tire on it.
i was surprised how well i could ride it downhill on the singletrack, of course when it was really technical i had to walked, but i could ride a lot more then i expected.
first pic: our team
second pic: my unis which i’ll take to the race (actually the 24" is not mine anymore, i sold it, the others will ride a kh, koxx and qu-ax, all 24")
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