Normally, I ride about 1/4 mile up the street and get to ride about 4 miles or so of muni trail, each way, half of which isn’t hardcore muni and a back half thats loaded with masive drops berms and all sorts of speedy stuff.
Within the past week a paved bike trail has been installed along the long road behind my house, and immediately, distance bikers started riding up the path more than normal…
Today, after lying in the sun for an hour, catching up on a good book, and working on my tan I decided to hop out and go for a ride. I emptied out my Camelbak with nothing but water in it’s bladder, popped on my shortest bikingshorts, and some sunglasses and away I rode, in nothing but shorts, a camelbak and sunglasses.
Since I live in the middle of the uphill trail, I decided to head upwards first to see how far it went. It was a lovely day, some breeze, and the ride up was super comfy. I made it to the top, just about 2 miles… not bad, I stopped checked my muni out, noticed a slight wiggle, and headed down my two mile ride. Since the wiggle was there, I decided to play it safe, and 1footed the last mile without dismount(I would have glided, but I had no leg, hands or head protection on), and improved my 1foot technique a bunch. Stopped at home, tightened a loose bearing bolt, and continued on…
On my way down to the bottom, back up to the top and down to the middle again, I had plenty of time to relax and think, since the trail was smoothe pavement and I didnt have to worry about riding. At one point I had completely forgotten I was riding and I just sat there floating along the path thinking about how awesome everything is. I was in THE DISTANCE ZONE!!! I now know why some people push themselves for the long 50+ mile rides. I myself have ridden over 25 miles in one run on a muni, but the last 6 were brutal, however after riding nearly 9 miles and stopping at my house, I decided to ride the trail again, covering another 6 miles. It was awesome, I had no pain, no anything, the unicycle was a pure extension of my legs in a completly different fashion than muni all together. In muni, you have to manipulate yourself, as well as the unicycle, to adjust for terrain, and you don’t achieve the togetherness that just rolling along without even knowing your riding brings.
I allofa sudden feel a great desire for a semi-distance/cruiser uni, and spening $100 on a 28" doesn’t sould like a bad idea at all, since I dont wanna wreck my gazz.
Happy Painti… I mean, riding. From me,
Bob Ro… I mean, Catboy.
P.S. A benefit of the riding, awesome sunburn, just what I wanted… truely!