This June, it’ll be two years since we started playing UniHoki regularly. In that time, I’ve taken to wearing rubber skate gloves to protect my hands. I play wearing a hydration pack as I had some problems with dehydration and I’ve fairly recently started wearing a helmet I originally bought for taking the Coker out on the road.
A couple of newer riders have taken to wearing soccer shinpads, mostly to protect against rapid-mount-induced-crank-ankle-scrapes. I recently found a pair in a second-hand shop and have been playing with them for a couple of weeks now.
Only problem is that the ones I bought aren’t the fancy ones with their own elastisized sock. You actually have to wear a sock over these. So I went out and bought some socks.
All told, getting ready for a game of UniHoki is beginning to feel a bit like going for a spacewalk and was definately reducing the simplistic man-on-unicycle appeal of unihoki.
I was also beginning to feel (and look, I suspect) like the Marlboro man.
Michelin Man! Sorry,freudian slip.
So, since I’ve haven’t really battled with ankle-scrapes recently, I decided yesterday that I would forgo the shinpads. Not only that, I would also announce to my colleagues that I would forgo shinpads.
Yeah, all rather silly.
We decided to play with one of the wooden balls again yesterday. We haven’t played with it for a while and the uni.com order with the street-hockey balls will only be here on Tuesday.
During the third game of the afternoon, I go rushing in on a loose ball, fighting Allan for possession. I succesfully lift the head of his stick to prevent him from getting the ball but miss it myself. The wooden ball is now right in front of my wheel and a Hookworm/wooden ball confluence leads only to a UPD.
Which seques quite nicely into one of those things I’ve been threatening to do for about 4 years now.
Take a hacksaw to the bit of the seat-clamp that sticks out beyond the quick release clamp. It’s not a major procedure and I should’ve done it ages ago.
Have I?
No.
Blood?
You betcha.
I’ll be padding up again next time.
