I’m really glad you posted that! I was saying just that on another thread the other day, that usually I felt varying equipment helped learning, but it felt so disorientating going back from 24" to 20" that I had more or less decided to leave the 24" until I had cracked the initial phase in case it slowed me down. Now I’m thinking it would be good to continue to mix it up. Thanks.
Mastering a uniwhip on a giraffe will prove this point 
Great post- thanks for sharing! Timely for me as today I made some nice progress learning to wheel walk on my 19" after I got home from a 36er ride- after many sessions with very slow progress I managed a number of 4-5 foot contacts before dismounting.
Excellent post, thanks for sharing Onetrackmind!
While I can’t be 100% sure that this applies to unicycling, I’ve long been wondering about that, if learning to ride or practice skills on more than one unicycle will make you a better unicyclist than if you trained on just one unicycle. For example, I have 2 unicycles, a 24" and a 29", and I’ve wonderd if riding the 29" has made me better on the 24" and vice versa. As far as I can tell, it has. Similarly, I think riding backwards has improved my forward riding ability a little bit.
These days I usually spend more time practicing skills like idling and backwards on the 24" than going for long rides on the 29", but whenever I do a long ride on the 29" I’m not rusty at all, and usually better than last time. I used to worry that I wasn’t riding enough on the 29" to improve my 29" riding ability, sometimes doing only a short 15 to 20 minute ride around the neighborhood on the 29" after 1 hour of backwards, idling, and juggling practice on the 24". Now I won’t worry as much.
On the other hand, juggling while unicycling hasn’t made me a better joggler; in fact, sometimes I think the opposite has happened. 
I’ve noticed even switching between skills helps… Working on freemounting, helped my distance riding… working on changing which leg I mounted from, helped my trail riding…and so on. Yet, simply riding daily, but not working on any skill seemed to slow my progress way down (maybe even send it backwards when I felt stale and it became a near boring chore…) Even taking a short break seemed to help my skills over slogging it out doing the exact same thing for days on end.
Maybe it is the novelty of the change that causes the brain to take notice rather than adopting a “been there done that” mentality that stalls advancement when a skill is precisely repeated.
Does switching from one size to another help improve learning…hmm…to a certain beginner I believe so. But to the mastery level, one should dedicate solely to a specific size, specific skill to master.
With that being said, Im terrible to this dedication thing. Just as I was getting good with the 26" Oregon I go jumping on to the 36er. Then got good with the 36er, and decided to fall in love with the 29er. Then the 700c. From getting used to long cranks to going to short cranks and now back to finding the climbing advantages to longer cranks.
But the problem is, Im starting the relearning process all over again to get my body get back the rythem to the longer cranks. Is not that I have started back to where I have left off, but a lot of time in the rededication of that particular wheelsize /crank/skill.
I’d say, dedicate more to a specific, and less jumping around, like me.
In other words, if you enjoy that one particular wheel, particular crank size stick to it more.
For this is how I see it, for example, riding 26"/127s will not improve your abilities to ride 150s better. It will only improve in your 26"/127s abilities and nothing else. Riding a 29" will not improve your 26". Riding your 36" will not improve your effeciencies on a 29er. Riding a bacon slicer will not improve riding your 29"/ 3.0 Knard.
Because even each crank size has it’s own mastery curve and to go back and forth feels terrible at first, and to start back to its inefficiencies.
But UPD, that is exactly what the research is saying is not true. It may be counter intuitive to you, but that seems to be where the evidence points. To me, it makes sense because the more ‘variations’ of a skill you give your brain to digest, the more it will become able to distinguish the essence of the skill that lies at the heart of the variations. So people who are brought up bilingual actually find it easier to learn a third language. Drivers who have driven only one make of car might be thrown by the different position of gears etc, but most experienced drivers have driven many cars and scarcely notice those differences. Unicycling on rough ground improves your skills when you come back to smooth ground. Etc.
Yes, to the general basic level yes it helps. To tinker with all sizes. But I believe what you dedicate and focus on one particular size ( for instance, the 26er) for that one task, for muni for 2 years straight you will far exceed in that particular skill and size, versus somebody who dabbles on all different sizes an acquires shallow all across skills but not in depth. I came to realize my muniing on the 36er does not better my skills on muni when I get back to my 26er.They feel different and perform different. Going shorter cranks does not increase my skills on the longer cranks, vise versa. It maybe harder to balance on a bacon slicer, but doesnt mean now that I am necessarily better on my, easy to balance more stable Knard. All I know is the amount of time that I spend on one particular wheel, the longer, the way better I get it, and I slowly lose the skills that I acquired from the other size wheels, or size cranks. So when I go back to it, there’s definitely a relearning period.
Sure, there’s an advantage to learning shallowly and broadly, but there’s also the major advantage of depth from years and years of dedication to a specific wheel, specific skill.
Ok, so here’s my case in point. So I started with my 20" rode for a while. Got ok , semi good at it, was able to learn a few trick mounts even. So then I went broad learning, picking up one upper size after another thinking it would improve my knowledge in riding the 20". Well, according to theory it should right? I have hundreds of hours of saddle time across many unis, cranks sizes, tire widths, all kinds of terrains including creeks and beaches.
A uni is a uni right? I should be excelling on the 20" right?
Errhhh… not exactly…I flop when I get back on the 20, it is reallllly unfamiliar to me. My hips hurt when I turn on it.
What happened?..Im suppose to be really good on it , especially with all these saddle time on these other unis.
Nope!
Im nearly back to beginner level and it’ll take me quite a while if I decidedly dedicate my time back onto it.
Yes, UPD, I’m sure that is exactly correct. No argument there. I’m still a beginner, with a 20", but when I found myself in a shop that actually sold unicycles, and which was selling the exact 24" I had been looking at online at what was obviously an ‘old stock’ price, I couldn’t resist and bought it. The first time I used it, it took a little while to get familiar, but then when I went back to my 20" it was like starting all over again. The message I might have taken was ‘stick to one size while learning’ but by coincidence this thread came up and it fitted with my experience in other fields so I have continued to use both. Now, switching is not a big deal in either direction, and the science suggests that even if I have slightly slowed my initial learning by adding a new challenge, I will reap the benefits by making my learning more comprehensive. Bilingual toddlers go through a short stage when they mix up their languages, but that soon gets sorted and the parts of their brain devoted to language learning are actually enhanced by the more generalised understanding of ‘what language is’. So this theory is not saying that switching it up will be initially easy; it’s saying that the extra work you make your brain do at that point will pay dividends once it gets it sorted.
A) I’ve come to believe that the sections at the end of technical papers with headings like “Summary,” “Conclusions,” or “Recommendations” are the most unreliable part, where authors are most likely to set aside proper scepticism and make unjustified claims. Unfortunately that’s also where civilian writers are mostly likely to pull quotes from.
B) A person in our world might do nothing but drown kittens or grind up butterflies and no one would find any fault as long as it was done “efficiently.” For unicyclists, efficiency means making the maximum progress in the least amount of practice time, maximum value at minimum cost. But for nearly all of us, the actual value of unicycling is the time spent practicing, not the results.
Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!
Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!
Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!
Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!Efficiency and Results!!Efficiency and Results!!! 
Well if you expect riding a 36 to help with your 20 riding you missed the point.
Try changing the crank length on the same uni, change by one wheel size and use the same crank length, mess about with the saddle height a little.
Don’t expect to come back to a 20 after not touching anything like it for months while you ride a 36 and expect the 20 to be easy.
I have a 20 with 100 mm cranks. I ride flat out on it and it helps with my cadence on bigger wheels. Riding it certainly helped when I put 100s on my 26.
When I stuck with a single spec uni for long periods I always found myself doing crazily bad attempts at freemounting immediately after changing to another. Now I mix it up with my unis regularly, I freemount them all far better and change from one to the other very easily. My freemount on the 29 with 125s improved after riding the 26 with 100s.
Combining variations in crank length and wheels really emphasises the relationship between them and I quickly developed a much better feel for where to apply the forces during the mount that I didn’t have when I just stuck to trying to get it right on one combination.
Switching between a 20" and 36" is not so subtle. My list of subtle changes:
- crank length
- tire pressure
- tire style
- seat height
- seat angle
- riding surface
Not sure mounting on either foot qualifies as a subtle change. I think it’s worthwhile.
Yeah, I guess you’re right. Remembering to mix it up once a while is a good thing. Recently, Ive been too focused on distance and short cranks. Been riding the 89s on the 700c, got to the point of being comfortable with it. Then went back to the 29/Knard, and all the sudden my Knard felt heavy. It took me a couple good days of ride to get back to the rhythm again. The brain and the muscle had to be retweaked to get it working efficiently again. Same goes with changing cranks from 127s to 150s. Felt miserable on the change. Especially bad on the middle of the trail ride. Again, it takes a few hours of brain to make muscle memory adjustments.
Last night was good. Got over my frustration. Plenty of practice back on the 150s learning new tricks and hops on the 29er. Soon I’ll be back on my beloved 26er again and dedicating myself to more muni with long cranks.
I need to ride my other unicycles more. In recent years it’s been almost exclusively the geared 36" for Road rides, and the Muni for dirt. Then the occasional playing around on the 20" Freestyle and much more rarely the other unis.
But back in the day when I did lots of performing, I rode them all regularly. I could jump from one to the other to the other and adjust after a few seconds. The biggest transition was always going from my 45" Big Wheel back to a 20" and trying to pedal smoothly.
I think doing the switching keeps your brain “flexible” in terms of reconciling those changes with the necessary mechanics of staying up on the uni. The same goes for switching crank lengths. Get stuck on a certain size for a long time, and making that switch is a much more difficult adjustment. I tried riding my new Muni in the 127 holes (instead of the 150s), on stuff that wasn’t steep, and it wore me out in minutes! While I would consider that size a little short for a 26" on dirt, I should still be able to do it. It’s just that I haven’t been riding anything with 125s in a long time.
This I don’t agree with. I had been riding with shorter cranks for a few months, coz I wanted a bit more speed and then when changing back to longer cranks, I found how much easier free-mounting had become. To me moving back to longer cranks certainly made balancing heaps better than before I changed to shorter cranks.
Yes, initially when you’re first learning and on basics it does indeed help(as I said previously), anything helps because your muscle memory is fresh and new. But when you take it up a notch and specialize in a certain discipline and learn on a deeper level, stick it out on the same cranks and wheel size for a good while for that in depth discipline.
The good thing about research is that it assesses multiple people and finds what works for most people. It’s possible that either A. you dont respond the same way as the majority of people do.
I believe the subtlety of change is important. Changing to something completely different does not help your brain work out how to do the similar skill.
I also think yes this method of training would give the greatest gains to complete noobs, but that is because they have the sharpest learning curve anyway. It still would benefit skilled riders however the change of unicycle would need to be subtle so that they were not learning an entirely different skills by switching to something really different.
There has been a lot of research on variable vs blocked practice. Subjects training shooting 20 hoops from the basketball free throw line or shooting 20 hoops from variable distances and positions around the hoop.
Those who do the variable distances and positions start off slowly but retain the skill, outperforming the free throw line group when they come back to test free throws 2 weeks later.
Those who just stood in the same spot for all throws get good at the arm movement during the session but require less processing to do it, those who had variable positions had to rethink EVERY time they shot based on where they were position and how far away from the hoop therefore their brain processed it better and retained it.
I think this occurs using slightly different Unicycle setups also. Your brain gets better at processing what it has to do and figuring it out for itself therefore improving its ability to think on the fly.
I think the same thing happens with street riders who do tricks on slightly variable surfaces compared to riders who only do flatland.
Street riders are quite happy to knock out tricks on weird angled, curved, bumped surfaces and get good at coping with anything. Riders who ONLY do flat generally find it hard to deal with even small oddities in riding surface.