I was buzzing through the City earlier today and I hear “nice Coker”… then on the way back from parking my car tonight… I hear those same words once again. A cab driver saw me riding and slowed down so I rode over to say hello… he mentioned my turns and told me had a Torker. After talking for a few minutes, I found out it was babyivan from the forum and then he parked his cab and gave my Coker a few tries. He managed to free mount several times (with a little help from the curb) and pedal a rev or so. Considering he doesn’t have too much riding experience and the seat was the wrong height for him… he did quite well! Well anyway… that’s all it took for babyivan to catch Coker Fever… and now he intends to buy one! It seems all you have to do is let someone try your Coker and then once they do they need to have one for themself!
i was vacinated for that fever long ago.
They WILL want one. That’s why I never let ANYONE ride my Coker. I don’t want them to steal it. I mean, you can’t outrun a Coker. *
When you blast through the city on your Coker, you send out the message “unicycling is COOL”. I suspect you are inspiring other people who simply don’t have the ability to catch up to you and tell you (only cab drivers have this ability – sometimes).
-
- not true. I actually let EVERYONE ride my amazing (and purple) Dave Stockton creation. Even mad scientists.
Yeah, I heard the story… some mad scientist who had some sort of bizarre Coker hating syndrome formulated a Coker vaccine, afflicting the vaccinated with a rare for of anti-Cokeritis and preventing them from admiring the true beauty of such an incredible machine. Fortunately, jagur is the only known recipient of the vaccine, other than the mad scientist himself. I’ve heard that the vaccine doesn’t work for geared uni’s or standard big wheels, though… so the day may still come when I get to see jagur fast and furious… actually, I think his BC riding already qualifies for that!
Thanks, Dave. Riding through the City, I hear comments on a pretty constant basis (usually several times, every time I go out). Fortunately, about 98% of them are positive, with a decent percentage of people really enjoying watching me ride… probably because most of them have never seen a unicycle with a 36" wheel before. People will often stop me or catch me when I’m getting on or off and they usually always have positive things to say and ask me questions… and I will spread the gospel about how great the sport is and tell them about the NYUC and the forum. I chat with people on the streets all the time. All the positive reactions and comments keep me from getting pissed off when the other 2% of the people sing the circus tune, ask me how my nuts feels, or throw snowballs at me in the Winter.
Thanx for the kind words!
Im still relatively new to unicycling…I have a hard enough time as it is on my Torker LX 26", let alone A Coker…size DOES make a difference!
I can tell you that the Coker is an impressive uni with a great potential for speed…the torque it takes to get it moving is quite noticably more than my Torker.
I definately caught the fever, Im gonna start saving up for one. 
HardcoreCokerRider can really “boogie” with that thing!
Ill tell you…even in NYC, a uni attracts so much attention…interesting.
People were freaking out when he was doing circles on Bleeker Street.
I agree wholeheartedly, I got the fever a few years ago, but I got over it without a vaccination. I just simply got rid of my coker. 
Haha, yeah, me too. I can admire the coker’s potential for country riding, but I just can’t see it as practical for city riding.
Why did you get rid of your Cocker?
I’ve got 2 Muni’s, a 700c wheeled uni and another 24" uni. The Coker just didn’t get used much after the newness and novelty wore off:)
That’s what happened to me! One 15 minute go of Roger(from UDCUK)'s Coker and I had one two weeks later.
My first go of a Coker and it had 110mm cranks! Managed to freemount it but didn’t have the guts to see how fast it went. With the tiny cranks it took me forever to slow it down!!
Cokers are indeed addictive.
T.
But things aren’t always as they seem. I got a thrill on my first Coker experience (which was a Coker muni ride) but it didn’t compare to the thrill of blasting down technical singletrack, airing over roots and rocks. And it’ll never have the same utility as a 20" or 24" in an urban setting. If I’m riding downtown and I wanna hop a staircase or ride a planter box, I’d be SOL if I were on a Coker.
IMHO, the big wheel just isn’t nimble enough to conquer narrow passages, nor is it safe for riding on high skinnies or super-steep, low traction sections. And until someone can grind, footplant or unispin on a Coker, I don’t see why you’d want to ride one in a skatepark… I can ride ramps and bowls all day long, but it gets old real quick… that’s why you see skaters working on airs, plants, grind, flip and spin tricks, and I believe that’s why uni riders are working on the same things.
Excuse my post if you feel it’s flamebait, but my opinions are built out of pure ignorance. I’m looking to elicit the Cokernaut’s perspective here. I understand the Coker is the right tool for the job when your job is distance riding, or high-speed riding on relatively tame terrain, but I don’t (yet?) understand why it’s being used for other applications.
Regarding single track… you can blast down technical single track faster and get more air over roots and rocks when you’re riding a Coker… bigger, higher, smoother, faster, more air = more fun. Plus you can also get enough speed, momentum, and smoothness to actually get up on the berm and ride it properly… which is extremely difficult to do for any decent length of berm, if not impossible, when riding a smaller wheel uni.
A Coker has WAY MORE utility than a smaller wheel uni in an urban setting (I live in NYC, the ultimate urban setting and ride through the City streets every day) because you can get where you want to go quickly and efficiently… and you can absolutely do the things you mentioned (hop a staircase or ride skinnies). I have hopped plenty of staircases (at least the ones I don’t feel like blasting right up - which you can’t do on a 20" or 24"… so there’s another example of how the Coker has more utility in the City - why waste time hopping when you can just power up the stairs?). I’ve also ridden plenty of planter boxes, highway dividers, and an assortment of other raised skinnies on my Coker.
Narrow passages aren’t a problem at all… I squeeze between cars and truck, cars and sidewalks, and a multitude of other urban obstacles on a daily basis.
Regarding skateparks… nothing beats blasting up a steep 10 - 15 ft ramp on your Coker, spinning a 180 at the top, and riding back down… don’t knock it til you’ve tried it! Dropping into mini half-pipes and riding over the spine and challenging yourself on the obstacles in a skatepark is a blast… and with a little creativity there are usually plenty of cool lines to attempt to challenge yourself. The tricks you mentioned (grind, unispin) are all possible on a Coker… there just aren’t that many people out there doing that stuff on a Coker, yet. Brian MacKenzie is incredible on a Coker and can mount straight to a wheel walk and I’m pretty sure Shadow can do a Unispin on his Coker… and there are plenty of others that can do incredible things on a Coker as well.
If you don’t agree, you simply need more time on your Coker 
and then you’ll see the light!
I already want a coker and my first uni hasn’t even arrived yet.
how can i protect myself so i that i dont catch this “fever”?i definitley dont wanna convert.
Unlike most diseases, this one can be caught from sharing a seat.
Stay far away if you do not wish to catch it
g1!
HCR, I believe we have a different definition of “technical,” “blasting,” “ultimate,” and, in some cases “riding”…
I’d have a hard time believeing one could land the airs I’m thinking about (ex: 3 ft drop, steep rollout) on a Coker given its wheel-to-crank ratio. Without a brake (which is how I ride), you’d have to backpedal with more force than your entire bodyweight to achieve the same control one can maintain on a 24"er with 170mm cranks. Take a look at some KH footage where he’s riding BC style stunts. Would you tell me you’d take that on a Coker?
As to narrow passages, I’m talking about weaving your wheel through ruts and between roots and rocks that could gobble up your tire. Imagine riding through a field of cinder blocks… I know you like to fly over everything, but in some cases that’s just not possible and one must resort to slow and controlled riding (see vivalargo’s posts about slow muni) to clean a section of trail. Is such riding possible on a Coker?
Also, what’s your effective turning radius at speed on loose ground? I’ve hit switchbacks that take all my effort to stay on-trail at speed. I have a hard time believing a larger wheel wouldn’t just go flying off the trail (not all switchbacks have berms). At this year’s CMW we were riding on some flaky shale and I layed down some tracks on the very edge of some turns, amazing myself that I stuck through the turn without heading down the cliff. I heard others weren’t so lucky.
As far as urban riding is considered, I’m not accepting your claims. I don’t doubt your riding, but I think your views of urban riding are much different from mine… I don’t doubt that you can ride skinnies on your Coker, but I’m still waiting to see how a Coker rider could pedalgrab or rolling hop onto a 2-3 ft. high ledge, then stick a 90 degree turn after a 45 degree down ramp. The sheer though boggles my mind (though I’d love to have my mind blown with a good video clip!)
I learned to ride stairs at my college, which had a number of 15+ stair sets, often one after the other with maybe 3-4 feet landings between each. If you could “blast your way up” one of these then I’ll rest my case. I’m working on 180 rolling hops down stair sets… how on earth could one hope work this move on a Coker? It’s a guaranteed ball-masher!
You say tech. street tricks are possible on a Coker, but who’s working on these tricks? Where are the videos? To me, it seems the sheer size and mass of a Coker would make it unsafe to practice anything but rolling and maybe some hopping… what happens when one blows a unispin or crankflip? It seems much easier to get one’s foot caught in the spokes of a Coker.
Again, I’m not trying to discount Coker riding or discourage any Coker riders, I love to see “mad skills” on any unicycle, but I’m hoping to add some color to your black and white picture. Cokers are not for everyone, and Cokers can’t outperform smaller wheels in every situation. There’s more to utility than being able to roll over everything, and there’s more to thrills than going fast.
If speed and efficiency were of concern, we wouldn’t be on unicycles, now would we? 
I’ll be the happy medium here:
I can cut and carve through you rocky cinderblocky sections of which you speak (there is a great 24 -> 36 comparrison in TWNR which involves a great deal of high speed manouvering through ruts+rocks)
I can hit a switch back going quite fast with or with out berms (you have two free hands, reach out and grab the tree that is being switch-backed around and you are sent flying in the new direction.
A 3 foot drop to a decline would not be a problem (if my 31 year old brain would sent me over the lip)
Many of the tricks and trialsy type stunts you describe would certainly not be possible on a Coker, what with the big heavy wheel, etc.
That is why we have different sort of unicycles to play on. I think the best option to take what your unicycle is good for, and try to master the skills that you should technically be doing on other unicycles, or as close to them as allows.
You can’t get up a 3 foot pedal grab like you suggest (well, I can’t) but let’s see trials unicycles get up one foot curbs at 25km/h. (continually over a great distance)
I bet your muni can’t get anywhere near up big skate park ramps as a Coker could…
There is not one uncycle ‘best’ at everything. Choose the one that allows you to be best at the stuff you find the most fun, and let other’s ride the ones that allow them to do the stuff they find the most fun.
I wouln’t even take the things Kris is riding on a 24" MUni, but I have started riding some pretty hairy (to me) skinnies and stunts.
I will provide you video of what Coker riding is all about soon enough.
the vaccine is built right in with the uni itself, the price! they are so freaking expensive. i would love one but cant afford it whatsoever