Progress diary

Off-topic
1

Hi all, newbie here :slight_smile:

I’m from Hungary, 21 years old, female.

On the other day I was getting home from the university and saw a guy unicycling, and I thougt “wow, WANT”, so on this whim I purchased a used uni from the local ebay like site.
It’s a QU-AX Luxus with the red ISIS hub, I payed ~60$, including shinguards, hoping that it was a good deal.

The uni arrived in the 23rd (december), and I’m practicing since.

So far I can ride with the help of a fence, and I’m getting the hang of freemounting, with 7 revolutions being the current best.

A few questions:
I feel like that I’d be better off with longer cranks (and since the left crank is too loose, I’ll need new ones no matter what), they’re currently 114mm.
On what basis should I choose?

Another one: when riding, is it good or bad practice to hold onto the seat with one hand? When mounting, most of the times I kinda automatically grab the seat, and usually it makes me inbalanced.

And the last one for now: I feel like that my dominant foot (right) is soo much more dominant, that I can’t really do anything with the other (not even like standing with my left foot in one pedal and the right on the ground).
Is there a good way to overcome this? How should I start?

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2

114 is a tad shorter than a typical learning size (125mm), but it’s not going to make the difference you think it is. I think that’s an excellent size, and it’s what I use for Freestyle (most Freestylers use shorter). Try not to ride with the crank loose; it wears down the hub. Tighten the nut/bolt really tight and see how it does.

Contrary to what you may be seeing in photos and videos of experienced riders, for learning and “regular” riding around, you don’t need to hold on. Especially during the beginner stages, as it frees up both arms to help with balancing.

Dominance is normal. To make your left leg less “shy”, I recommend doing just what you said; practicing mounts with your left foot. Don’t worry, unless you have physical or neurological impairments, your left leg will learn faster than your right leg did (this is because it has something to copy from). The more you work that left leg, the more skillful it will become. Don’t worry, you can do it!

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Hey there! Just thought this thread was interesting to me because I’m also a 21 year old female who just got a unicycle (got it for Christmas, started the day after).

Sounds like your progress is going much faster than mine, although I’m very bad at things that involve skill. :wink:

How useful is free mounting this early on? Should I just be working on getting further without holding on? I think my best is only about two revolutions at this point. :S

4

Hello to both of you :slight_smile:

tpv… what John said. He has a habit of giving good advice.

MissScooties, you have to be able to ride off otherwise there’s no point in learning to free mount. I think you should concentrate on riding first. You’ll know it’s time to work on free mounting when you can ride far enough that it’s annoying to walk back.

Keep practicing. It’s amazing how far you can get by being persistent.

5

Things to note till now

@johnfoss: Thanks for the tips :slight_smile:

I went out to practice a bit, and it feels like I’m on the right track. I’m “better” at the freemount, feeling much more stable than before. Also improved the sucess rate of being able to move forward a bit, so I’m happy :slight_smile:

So I’m just going to write down the things I did up till now, maybe itt will be useful to others.

In the first and the second day I practiced indoors, holding firmly into a pole, just sitting on the uni, getting comfortable first (trying to put all the weight in to the saddle). First only did this with my dominant foot on the lower pedal. Then on the second day I went out to the garden, and tried riding along the fence, which I could do nothing at all :D, the uni always slipped out below me.

Then I practiced just sitting with my non-dominant foot in the lower pedal, which was hard at first, but helped a lot in feeling the balance. Also did a few idles with both feet (grabbing onto the pole of course).

After this, riding along the fence became so much easier. However I noticed that because of the comfort of the fence I didn’t really try to let go, so I decieded to try to learn mounting, and with that practice the riding without the fence.

Well, it is a tough one. First I tried with grabbing onto a pole, and push the closer pedal down with my dominant foot, bringing the uni below me. This wasn’t so hard, but without a pole I could do nothing. Even if I could stay on the uni for a little time, I could not start riding with the 6-12 pedal positions.
So this didn’t really helped mounting, but I think it was useful to get used to the uni, feel the balance, and to learn what happens if I put my weight on one pedal.

I did this for days, and at some moment, I just realized, what should I do, how to make it work. The key factor was, for one thing, to position the closest pedal a bit higher than horizontal, almost even with the forkleg (with the saddle between my legs), and the other is trying NOT to put weight on the pedal, just push the uni a bit forward while jumping, and like this place my other foot to the other pedal. With this my weight is much more on the saddle, and I also start out with a 9-3 pedal position from I can start riding.
I’m kinda doing it like in this video:

First it was really hard to try to maintain the balance after the mount, but I found out, that if I look ahead, and concentrate my vision in one fixed point (index lamp of the car in the garage in my case) really helps a lot.

And this is where I stand now, half of the times I can stay a bit on the uni, quarter of the times do at least a half rev, few times a little bit more.

@MissScooties: I feel like learning to mount like this helps me more, than doing rides along the fence, but that’s just me :slight_smile:
I read everywhere to learn to ride first, because freemount is kinda useless if you can’t ride from it, but well, I think I’m trying to learn both at once.
Try it out, maybe it helps you too.
What I think really important at first is to really be comfortable in the seat, and also don’t be afraid of falling (because you can’t really fall that big).
And also they say it’s not really about skill or balance, it’s much more about patience and persistance, so just don’t give up :wink:

6

Agreed on freemounting

Agreeing with the other guys here. I just recently learned to ride decent, and learning to freemount should probably come after you’re comfy and consistently riding 50-100 feet.

I myself got the freemount a bit earlier than I could do that and found that I couldn’t go very far though I could mount and get going alright.

Excited for you two that you got unicycles! I’m sure you’ll have tons of fun! :slight_smile:

Edit: Gonna add a few links to journals (mine shamelessly included) that I’ve found immensely helpful in learning, and also very encouraging.

The most important thing is to just keep at it. You’ll get it, it’s just a matter of time =)

7

Hello tpv and MissScooties!

Welcome to the best place on the internet!
There are lots of friendly, helpful people here.

Have fun… and keep at it.
Persistence is the key.

Keep us posted.

8

Definitely thinking about keeping a progress journal. Will probably help keep me motivated, although the slow progress I am making is pretty motivating. :slight_smile:

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Both of you keep it here since you’re starting the same time! :slight_smile:

And in reply to the other thread, no Scooties, not really. I think the times I’ve not landed on my feet were about twice (the last one in that video you saw, and the first one somehow the unicycle stayed under me as I fell and it looked like I was sitting down on it with my hands behind and feet in front) and haven’t really hurt myself. …and that wasn’t the question. No, I’ve hit my shins a couple times, but mostly because the foot got stuck on the pedal or my shoe slipped.

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@MissScooties: You’re very welcome to keep your journal here if you’d like :slight_smile:
My opinion on shinguards: since they came with the package and I have metal pedals, I’m happy I have them, but it was only a few times I actually hit my shins, just like Galthrojh. Also PC pedals are not that dangerous, but it depends on you, how cautios you want to be, one thing for sure, it won’t hurt to have them :slight_smile:

11

I feel like I would really at least like the shin guards, I already have whacked my shins a couple times, and that’s even holding on to something, haha. Right now I’m really going with only a helmet. What is everyone here going with? I feel like I might be more willing to let go and really go for it if I had reassurance that something would prevent me from wiping out so painfully.

Luckily, no major falls yet, just a few kind of skips off the uni but I know that won’t last forever for sure, escpecially when you’re on your own. Just dunno where really to look around stores near me, since I’d like to try them on to make sure they fit, and I live in kind of a small town.

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Hi tpv and MissScooties!

Definitely keep your comments on the same thread, especially since it is a generic name. You will have others join in too, off and on, and it will probably develop into an often visited thread. You two will likely be great uni/forum buddies. How cool is THAT!

About the safety gear:
I have been happy to have every piece of safety gear that I now wear.

Elbow Pads: One of my worst UPDs was when the uni threw me forward unexpectedly. I couldn’t outrun the momentum and finally ended up flat on the concrete, front down. I was wearing elbow pads, but somehow or another I scraped my elbow much deeper than I would have imagined. I wondered how bad the scrape would have been without the elbow pads.

Knee Pads: The first time I hit my knee was when I was practicing holding on to a wall. I slipped and went down on my knee pretty hard, but nothing was hurt due to the knee pads.

Helmet: To be honest, I thought I was never going to need any of that safety stuff…
because I was going to be careful. :smiley: That didn’t seem to work very well.
The first time I left my safety zone and tried the open driveway, I fell backwards and hit my behind, followed by my head, on the cement. That very afternoon I was in the store buying all the safety gear I could find.

Gloves: Love 'em. I practiced along a wooden railing for a long time, and the gloves kept me from getting splinters, but they also save your hands if you hit the cement.

KH Shin Guards: Alucard inspired me to get some of those spiffy KH Shin Guards. At first I didn’t like them, because they felt so different. Now I like them very much and would not ride without them. They add another level of safety and confidence.

Confidence: YES! Wearing the gear DOES help your confidence level.
…and I still need as much of that as I can muster!

As for where to look… I needed/wanted my gear in a hurry and didn’t want to pay a fortune for it (at first). I found the knee pads, elbow guards, and gloves at Walmart (OK, no laughing or rolling eyes :roll_eyes: ). I’m still using the elbow pads, and I still love the gloves, but I have given up the knee guards for the $66 KH variety.
You have to look in different departments. I didn’t find everything right there in the “bicycle” department.
(Try where the skateboards are… and general gloves).

The one thing I tried that did NOT work for me was wrist guards. I found those at Academy near the skateboard gear. The plastic piece was too much for me. It almost hurt my hand just wearing it, and I really think if I had fallen on it, my hand would have been injured much worse with it than without it… so I just stick with the slightly padded gloves. They are comfortable.

Happy Riding!

13

I feel like I need to go and ride! But my cousin is visiting and I definitely want to spend the time with her while I can. Working Saturday and Sunday 7 to 4, but that gives me lots of time in the afternoon to work on it. I have set up extra chairs now because every now and then I’ll have a decent run and go further than I used to. =) Gonna eventually have to leave the barn though, it’s only so long. Luckily I have a really long driveway (probably like 100 meters or so), cause I live on a busy road.

14

Is there a paved fenced off area you can go to? Like basketball/tennis court, even the parking lot by the side/back wall of a big store :slight_smile:

15

Definitely pumped to learn free mounting. I have a friend who rides in college (actually let me ride her unicycle, the whole reason I am trying to learn now =) ) and she can ride very well (no tricks), but she does not free mount. Would be pumped to come back and be able to actually show her something!

16

So it felt too depressing watching the ball drop by myself, plus not like I really liked this year… So I spent New Years in the barn practicing. Set my phone alarm to midnight and it went off right as I was starting an attempt. (thought it would have been funny if it had gone off while I was on the floor =P )
Here’s to a better year this year.
Does unicycling into the new year give one extra luck? :wink:

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I hope so! I did too.

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I’d hate for somebody to injure themselves due to not having protective gear, and it’s really up to you how much you feel comfortable with, but feel I should point out that you don’t need to cover yourself in the stuff just to ride a uni. I’m still a very new rider, and learnt to ride with no protective gear at all - not even gloves or a helmet. Until I’d actually learnt to ride, I found that every time I came off I landed on my feet - occasionally hit my shins with the pedals, but as they were rubbish plastic pedals without much in the way of pins, that wasn’t a problem, and by the time I got better (but still plastic) pedals I’d mostly got over that.

It was only once I could ride and started trying stuff like riding off kerbs that I started not landing on my feet - first started wearing the MTB gloves I already owned, then bought some KH ones with wrist protection when I got my 26" muni (about 6 weeks in to learning). I now wear those and a helmet for muni, and tend to add shin pads for practicing new hoppy stuff as I do seem to get pedals flying around and got some bad bites before I got the pads. Will probably add knee and elbows for bigger jump stuff. However for transport riding (the school run) I still just wear basic gloves and nothing else.

Good luck with the learning. I learnt to freemount after I could already ride 50m or so, but a lot sooner than I expected. Look up the Megan Rouch videos for a demo of a really easy freemount for beginners using a hand on the tyre - I got this working better than 50% within an hour of trying. It’s interesting to see how others learn depending on what you have available - I didn’t have a handy fence, but a nice well surfaced traffic free area right in front of my house, hence jumped in at the deep end mounting using my car to help and then attempting to ride off. Took a lot of attempts even to manage a couple of revs, but when I did get going I had no crutch to get rid of.

19

I’m a bit like aracer in that I learned with no protective gear, it simply wasn’t needed. I learned (and learn) at a very slow pace, I’m no athlete so it takes me a very long time to learn how to control my body. I had a mentor in the beginning and I never tried anything before I was ready. I never used any protective gear because I never had a fall where I didn’t land on my feet and I never had an incident with the pedals hitting my shins.

Those were the days where all I did was freemount and ride forward on pavement… then I decided to take up muni and went with a helmet and gloves. Muni introduced me to falling off my unicycle. I also got my first pedal/shin strike - I still remember where I was when that happened. It has since happened about 3 times. I wonder just how much a shin guard would help in my situation because each of the 3-4 times the pedal landed very close to my ankle, below where I think a shin guard would protect. Maybe I’m wrong, still I want to get some shin guards.

Now I find myself wanting to hop obstacles and learn skills I never picked up and I’ve had it put to me this way: A few hundred dollars in protective gear. How many seconds in an ER would a few hundred dollars buy you?

99.99% of the time you won’t need protective gear so you think you could do without, but it’s nice to have it there because you’ve got to be prepared for all eventualities. That said, I think a helmet, wrist guards, and shin guards is where I would make the cut-off for me.

Also, I don’t know if it is me and how I am slow to learn or reluctant to even attempt new skills but you might want to start learning to idle early on. I learned uni to commute, forward was enough for me. A few years of that, then retiring as a rider for a decade, then coming back I’m finding that my brain simply won’t allow me to pedal backward. Part of it is likely the very solid muscle memory of only going forward all this time, and part of it is purely mental, I’m now afraid to even try. :o

20

Well, I skipped a few days of practice because of bad weather/mood :(, but meanwhile I went out and bought a new set of cranks (125 mm nimbus).

I tried it just now, since the weather is finally clean, and there’s beautiful moonlight outside :slight_smile:
All I can say is wow :D, the longer cranks make soooo much difference. I feel much more comfortable, and I can balance easier like this, so I’m really happy.
The overall feel is totally different.

I have like 4 exams comig up in the next two weeks, so I’m gonna be quite busy, but I plan to practice at least half an hour every day…