Unicycle articles (but wait there's more...)

General
518

John’s a big wheel in the world of bikes

By Stephanie March
400 words
22 November 2005
Canberra Times
6
English
© 2005 The Canberra Times

He can’t juggle, but John Cooper can ride a unicycle, and he’ll be showing off his talent this weekend as a competitor in the Great Victorian Bike Ride. The 60-year-old Ainslie resident took up the sport 3years ago after being inspired by a photo of a unicycle in the local paper. ‘‘I saw that there was a group in Canberra that taught you how to ride unicycles, and it just appealed to me,’’ he said yesterday. Never before has a unicyclist participated in the 580km, nine- day event which Mr Cooper intends to complete in the same amount of time as an average cyclist. The Swiss-built custom unicycle

he will be using has the same size wheel as a normal bicycle and uses a high and a low gear. ‘‘It will cruise at about 18km/h,’’ he said. It costs $3000, as much as many two-wheeled bikes. Mr Cooper rides his unicycle to his job as an IT manager at the Australian Taxation Office and has been covering several hundred kilometres a week in preparation. He and his partner, Cathy Chin, have been training together and she will ride with him next week on a recumbent bicycle, on which a cyclist lies back to pedal. ‘‘We go at about the same pace, I go faster up hills and she goes faster down hills, but we are pretty good at keeping together.’’ Mr Cooper admitted it could get get a bit uncomfortable in the

saddle after a while, but he hopes to complete the longest leg of the event in under 10 hours. The Great Victorian Bike Ride is just the beginning for Mr Cooper, who is heading off on a unicycle tour of Laos in January. ‘‘A bunch of unicyclists from around the world, about 20, are getting together to do the ride. It’s being organised by a guy in New Zealand, and it looks like fun.’’ Mr Cooper says unicycling was not really an ‘‘old-person’s sport’’, but said anyone could learn with practice. ‘‘When you first start learning you’d swear that it wasn’t possible to ride. Learning to walk is quite a complex activity, but once the brain works it out it does it instinctively. With the unicycle it is a bit the same.’’

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519

Look Ma, no hands! Conquering the great outdoors on one wheel

By JANICE PODSADA
Associated Press Writer
998 words
21 November 2005
00:00
Associated Press Newswires
English
© 2005. The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

PHILADELPHIA (AP) - Marta Zwierzynski knew the relationship was getting serious when her boyfriend, Chris Wonderly, had a Unistar LX shipped to her home in Hatfield, just outside Philadelphia.

It didn’t have a doublewide, downhill rim or a 3-inch fat tire, but it was street-legal and ready to ride.

“I thought Chris ordered it for himself,” Zwierzynski says.

But no, it was her own unicycle. “It took me about three months to learn, although I didn’t ride it everyday,” says Zwierzynski, a 25-year-old chemist.

One world, one nation, one wheel. While the first two may not be attainable, there’s hope for the third. Why waste valuable resources to manufacture a two-wheeled bike when one wheel will suffice?

And just like rock beats scissors, cruising along on one rim nearly always puts mountain bikers, skateboarders – even motorcyclists – to shame.

Vroom, vroom. I’m hell on wheel.

While unicycling was once limited to sidewalks and sideshows, it now embraces the Great Outdoors.

Like other beginners, Wonderly was content, at first, to roll along on concrete – until he veered onto the grass one day, and then onto the dirt. After that, smooth surfaces lost their appeal.

“I just kept challenging myself,” says Wonderly, 26, who began riding about five years ago.

Most people can learn to ride a unicycle in about 15 hours, says John Drummond, the owner of Unicycle.com, an online retailer based in Marietta, Ga.

In the last decade, off-road, cross-country and mountain unicycling have become popular with kids and adults, says Drummond, who learned to ride when he was 12. He gave it up as a teenager, only because “you can’t pick up a date on a unicycle.”

When he began riding again at age 40, Drummond took the family to the National Unicycle Convention in Seattle in 1999 and discovered one-wheelers who were bouncing down mountains.

Worldwide, he says, about 3,500 people engage in extreme unicycling.

A standard street unicycle costs about $100, but the skinny tire and lighter axle aren’t built to withstand a beating. Off-roaders should plan to spend at least $300 or $400 for a unicycle, helmet, and the very-necessary padding. A basic off-road model starts at about $200, while a handcrafted top-of-the line model can cost more than $1,500, Drummond says.

And lest you think one wheel is too dangerous for navigating rugged terrain, think again, says Wonderly, a mechanical engineer from Exton.

The original “Look Ma, no-hands!” sport is safer than mountain biking, he says.

A mountain bike can reach speeds up to 30 mph. Fall, and you can get tangled up in the handlebars or frame, says Wonderly, a former mountain biker.

“Every single mountain bike rally I was in – at least one person got taken away in an ambulance,” Wonderly says. “It made me think.”

And in a nod to Mother Nature and tree-huggers, a unicycle (top speed 10 mph) doesn’t tear up the turf like a mountain bike, Wonderly says. “When people ride mountain bikes, they tend to skid with their rear tire and it erodes the trail. Unicycles can’t skid,” Wonderly explains.

If that isn’t enough convincing, then there’s the mega-cool factor: Dang, if you don’t look awesome – padded up like a 7-foot tall Power Ranger astride that single, fat tire.

“It looks like you’re ready for combat,” Drummond says. “Helmet, wrist guards, forearm pads.”

Real aficionados like Jeff Prosa, 27, of Cresskill, N.J., add a pair of black, over-the-knee shin guards, specially designed for off-road unicyclists.

Prosa tried other outdoor sports before settling on extreme unicycling.

Mountain biking? “I just couldn’t get into it” Prosa says.

Skateboarding? “Not a lot to do there – you’re just rolling up and down on ramps.”

Unicycling with a friend in college, he found his niche. “I enjoy being outdoors. The downhills are a lot of fun, and you can go a lot of places a bike can’t,” Prosa says.

On a balmy September afternoon, Zwierzynski, Wonderly, Prosa and Mike Malsbury, 26, of Horsham, assemble at Fairmount Park in Philadelphia to conquer the bumpy trails and rocky outcroppings that hug the banks of Wissahickon Creek.

“It’s a lot more careful and meticulous than mountain biking,” Wonderly says. As the afternoon proceeds, that becomes apparent as Wonderly and Prosa size up each new challenge.

Here, an 8-foot chunk of metamorphic rock; there, a 20-foot fallen tree lying on the forest floor at a 30-degree angle. What’s the slope, how slick is that log? Which route won’t kill us? Hop it or zoom it?

Hikers who encounter Wonderly bunny-hopping down a set of natural stone steps, or Prosa gliding along a fallen tree, are astounded.

“To see these guys on a unicycle is extraordinary. It’s like walking on water,” says Vince Romano, 49, of Philadelphia.

Wendy Foulke, 62, of Wyndmoor, watches as Wonderly executes a slow-motion flight off a 4-foot rock ledge.

“Wow, you could be made into a woman if you don’t land right,” Foulke says.

“I hope it’s not that easy,” Wonderly answers.

The trick, he says, is to lift off the seat and stand on the pedals.

You don’t, however, have to pogo up and down rocks to unicycle the Great Outdoors.

Zwierzynski, for one, prefers navigating the gentler stretches of trail on her Torker Unistar LX while her fiance tackles the rocks.

Oh, did I mention?

After her unicycle arrived, it wasn’t long before the ring showed up.

A year later, Zwierzynski and Wonderly are engaged, and she carries her unicycle, at all times, in the trunk of her Acura.

“You never know when you’ll need it,” she says.

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Extreme Unicycling: Where to begin, how to do it

By the Associated Press
292 words
21 November 2005
00:00
Associated Press Newswires
English
© 2005. The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

Facts about unicycling:

EXTREME UNICYCLING: The sport is known by several names; some call it mountain unicycling or MUni; others refer to it as rough terrain unicycling.

“Anyplace a mountain bike can go, a mountain unicycle can go,” says John Drummond, the owner of Unicycle.com, an online unicycle retailer. If you already ride a unicycle, try rolling over the lawn (your own – not the neighbors); then practice idling – rocking back and forth-- and hopping.

Always wear a bicycle helmet. For additional protection, add the wrist and forearm guards that are designed for inline skating. Mountain unicyclists generally wear the same protection as mountain bikers.

However, you don’t have to bounce over dirt trails to have fun. If you want to learn to ride a unicycle, start with a standard street model. Most beginner’s models cost about $100 to $150. It takes about 15 hours to learn. You can do it all at once or spread your practice sessions over several weeks or months. Unicycling is great exercise and you can get a good workout in a small area, Drummond says.

MEET OTHER UNICYCLISTS: Log onto http://www.unicycling.org The Web site lists, by state, the e-mail addresses of unicyclists who’re looking for riding buddies. Plus there’s lots of good information on learning to ride, and buying a unicycle that fits your size and needs, plus upcoming events.

WHERE TO SEE IT: On Feb. 18 and 19, head for the Motorama Indoor Races and Speed Show in Harrisburg, Pa., to see unicycle agility trials, as well as bicycle and motorcycle competitions. On the net: http://www.motoramaassoc.com/motor--index.php

521

One-wheelin

Nicole Lessin
EXPRESS-NEWS STAFF WRITER
647 words
16 November 2005
San Antonio Express-News
STATE&METRO
1NC
English
© Copyright 2005 San Antonio Express-News. All Rights Reserved.

The day Scott Wallis saw a video clip of mountain unicycle pioneer Kris Holm riding down a volcano, he knew he had found his passion.

Wallis had injured his neck from barefoot waterskiing and mountain biking and could no longer bend over to hold the handlebars of his bike.

The mountain unicycle’s upright position and its promise of off-road adventure were a perfect fit.

More than a decade ago, when Matt Kuhfahl lived on a military base in Japan, he noticed a prevalence of school supply stores with unicycles for sale. Kuhfahl begged his parents to buy him one and taught himself to ride in one day.

Kenny Munn could not afford a sports car when he turned 50, so he settled for a $300 mountain unicycle with a Ferrari-red seat cover instead.

Though these men range in age from their 20s to their 50s, they have this fact in common: They use their unicycles to navigate dirt trails, stony hills and gnarled tree roots with an informal group of guys who look nothing like juggling circus performers or any other rider one normally associates with the one-wheeled conveyance.

The unicyclists primarily meet on Sundays at McAllister and O.P. Schnabel parks to get their dirt fix.

This is hard core, not something a geek would do,'' said Munn, a former motorcycle racer and mountain biker. It’s got a real steep learning curve. Most people give up on it.’’

It’s no wonder, either.

On a unicycle, you have no gears or a handlebar. Often, you don’t have any brakes, either.

In the beginning, most novices yearn for a second ``training wheel’’ after expending all their energy just trying to stay upright.

In contrast, some of these off-road unicyclists can hop off rock ledges and jump over logs.

Others can even travel long distances.

Every hill you do, it's just you and the unicycle,'' said Joe Wilson, who has ridden from San Antonio to Corpus Christi on his 36-inch wheel for the MS 150 Bike Tour, an event that raises funds to aid those with multiple sclerosis. You can’t coast.’’

Wilson made the journey with Kuhfahl.

It’s not hard to understand why these off-road unicyclists don’t appreciate hearing people whistle circus tunes when they are out riding.

Wilson has even made his wife a solemn promise.

``If she sees me juggling while on my unicycle, she can shoot me,’’ he said with a laugh.

For his part, Wallis – who was the first member of the group to start these rides four years ago – said the difficulty of the sport has been a main attraction.

It looked like it would be an interesting challenge mainly,'' he said. It must be enough of a challenge to make it worth doing.’’

Though Wallis has not yet gone down a volcano, he has maneuvered his lightweight unicycle down the Santa Barbara Mountains in California.

What’s more, he’s learned that his neck feels better from moving his arms around to pivot on his unicycle.

If I don't ride every week, my neck will start hurting,'' he said. It’s therapy.’’

For more, go to www.alamounicycle.com or e-mail Wallis at scott@wallisdesign.com.

nlessin@express-news.net

  1. Jeff Prado rides his unicycle with a group of fellow unicyclists at McAllister Park Nov. 6. 2. Kenny Munn tackles treacherous terrain as he and his fellow unicyclists do some off-road riding at McAllister Park. 3. Matt Kuhfahl rides his unicycle at McAllister Park. Unicycles have no handlebars and often have no brakes. 4. Jeff Prado (left) and Joe Wilson ride their unicycles at McAllister Park. The unicyclists do most of their off-road riding on Sundays. PHOTOS BY ROBERT MCLEROY/STAFF
522

Hypochondriacs, fret not: Book tells what ails you

Mark Wolf, Rocky Mountain News
638 words
14 November 2005
Rocky Mountain News
FINAL
7D
English
© 2005 Denver Publishing Company, Rocky Mountain News. Provided by ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights reserved.

Be wary of that doorknob.

If it’s contaminated with germs - you non-hand-washers know who you are - it can spread infection to the first 14 people who touch it.

Almost everything you do, ingest or even think about is capable of inflicting mortal damage, some experts somewhere say. At least now we’ve got your mind off the bird flu.

In 15 years of writing about health, John Naish of The Times of London squirreled away reports about odd diseases and syndromes. He cleared his file cabinet to produce Hypochondria Can Kill: A Disease for Every Occasion, An Illness for Every Symptom (Plume, $14), a guide for the health-fretter in all of us.

Hypochondria, Naish believes, is on the rise because we have more time to worry: “It’s a bit of an illness of luxury. More and more of us have the time and the luxury to worry about things. We’re bombarded by the Internet, by magazines that all have health sections. They do play on the imaginations.”

Take beauty parlor syndrome. After seeing five women ages 54 to 84 who had strokes after visiting the beauty parlor, a doctor hypothesized they could have been caused by women bending their necks over a beauty parlor sink.

“It has happened to people, but it’s very, very rare,” said Naish, who includes medical journal/research citations with the entries.

His intent, Naish said, was to provide “a mass inoculation into this stuff, to say, ‘Why worry? Get on with one’s life.’ People who worry obsessively about their health are more likely to die early.”

The book is packed with syndromes, including Unicyclists Sciatica, caused by “the rider putting all of his or her weight on the perineum.”

Confirmed germophobes will find much to work themselves into a lather about. "The point is that if you were to swab anybody, you’d find people are full of bacteria. That’s what being human is all about. There should be a slogan: ‘Get out of your body. It’s full of germs.’

“There’s something called the hygiene hypothesis that said if you compare children brought up on farms with children brought up in very persnickety, germ-wiped households, the farm kids have much lower levels of asthma and allergies.”

Anyone with a sour tummy and an Internet connection can become a cyberchondriac. Naish himself fell victim:

“I was having a bit of a stressful time and started getting pins and needles in my fingers. I got up at 2 a.m., got onto the computer and typed my symptoms into Google. Very helpfully, it came back with ‘It’s stress,’ but it’s so easy to get another 5,000 opinions that it’s a brain tumor or multiple sclerosis.”

He found a study reporting 2,500 people a year are injured while brushing their teeth: “What are they doing? I do walk around brushing my teeth . . . Are they brushing their gums away through some kind of hygiene frenzy?”

Naish devotes a chapter to the “nocebo effect,” which he calls the dark side of the placebo effect: “If you tell someone that something . . . might cause stomach upset, gastric problem or headache, people do report that that’s what happened to them. The mind has a huge and important role to play in these symptoms.”

The soundest health advice, says Naish, may be to simply have a nice day: " ‘Don’t worry’ seems to be a good health prescription, and laugh more. It increases the amount of oxygen in your body and gives you a little muscle workout."

wolfm@RockyMountainNews.com or 303-892-5226

Photo; Caption: John Naish dug up odd tidbits in 15 years of writing about health.

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Here’s a link to the article from the newpaper’s website.

Tall in the saddle for Macy’s parade ; Scarborough’s troupe of unicyclists will have great seats for the famous event in New York City.

MARK PETERS Staff Writer
808 words
22 November 2005
Portland Press Herald
Final
B1
English
Copyright © 2005 ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights reserved.

For months, the parking lot of a school in town substituted for a New York City street. A troupe of unicyclists looped the asphalt countless times, seated almost 6 feet above the ground. They pedaled, rode in formation and occasionally fell, until riding on one wheel was like walking.

The early-morning practices will be put to use Thursday in front of a huge audience. Fifty-five members of The Gym Dandies Children’s Circus will ride in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, which more than 50 million people are expected to watch on television as it winds through Manhattan.

Their perch on the high-rise unicycles known as “giraffes” will give the riders from Scarborough a perfect view of throngs of people gathered along the route.

“We are going to be the tallest things in the parade,” said Laura Przybylowicz, a sixth-grader.

One of her fellow riders, Zack Pelczar, corrected her, saying, “Except for the balloons.”

The students will ride among those giant balloons as well as singing celebrities, marching bands and 1,600 cheerleaders. Back in Scarborough, families will watch to see if the unicyclists make the parade’s national television broadcast on NBC.

“Definitely a chance of a lifetime,” said Cindy Harmatz, whose 12- year-old daughter, Hannah, will ride with the group.

Getting a chance to ride in the Macy’s parade puts the Gym Dandies among the elite of performance groups.

Jon Cahill, director of the Gym Dandies, described Macy’s as the “national championship” of parades.

Thousands of acts apply to perform each year, and Macy’s officials say only 10 performing groups and 10 marching bands are chosen.

The size, skill and height of the unicyclists is what made their audition tape stand out. They rise above the marching bands and clowns, said Orlando Veras, spokesman for Macy’s.

“We wanted them. We thought it was a fun idea. They were solid performers,” he said.

The unicyclists are a mix of boys and girls. They range from fifth-graders who have just mastered the unicycle to high school students who do mountain-unicycling down rugged trails on the weekends.

Each had to demonstrate proficiency on a regular unicycle before they could ride the 6-foot version. Only one member of the unicycle troupe won’t be riding in the parade. He broke his collarbone playing soccer.

The 2.5 mile-route along Central Park West, down Broadway past Macy’s, is an aerobic challenge for a unicyclist. There is no coasting on one wheel. Riders have to pedal constantly to stay upright.

A group of parents will walk the route beside the riders to act as spotters and help them back onto the cycles if they fall.

Falling, however, isn’t much of a problem for the riders, some of whom who have been practicing for years on the one-wheel devices.

“Right now, they are so comfortable, they’re going to be able to enjoy the parade route,” Cahill said.

524

Will someone be able to capture- and post it if they do?
And I really can’t imagine the TV-crew will ignore them.

525

http://www.moorparkacorn.com/news/2005/1202/Community/016.html on Mark Cyffka:

[I]Mark also has an unusual hobby—riding unicycles. He started when he read about a man who rode all the way from Los Angeles to New York on a unicycle. “I was amazed,” he said, prompted to try out the hobby. However, unlike some hobbies, unicycling proved to be as hard as it looked, if not harder, he said.

“At this point, professional unicyclist is not high on my list of viable career options,” he said. [/I]

526

It’s wheely hard for one to sustain hockey balancing act

By Emma Tinkler
371 words
5 December 2005
Canberra Times
5
English
© 2005 The Canberra Times

As if trying to stay on top of a unicycle isn’t hard enough - consider the tricky balancing act required to play unicycle hockey. A group of enthusiastic unicyclists from Canberra and Sydney made it look decidedly simple - but still exhausting - in a series of matches near Old Parliament House yesterday. Teams made up of players from both cities competed for a gold medal in front of a small but enthusiastic crowd enjoying a host of cycling-related activities as part of the inaugural ACT bike-fest, the Brindabella Challenge. ACT Unicycle Riders Society president Rod Lambert said unicycle hockey was ‘‘very, very strenuous exercise’’. ‘‘Ten minutes of hockey played well is very tough,’’ he said. ''But it’s a low-impact sport and it’s really just a matter of endurance.

Once you have the basic skill levels it’s a matter of having the energy to go on with it.’’ Unicycle hockey had been played as an organised sport in Canberra since 2001, and a team competed at the National Unicycling Championships in Darwin in July, Mr Lambert

said. However, the Canberra team consisted of quite a few young players and was no match for the champions from Sydney. Unicycling generally had grown in popularity over the past five years, and there were some 50 unicyclists in the Canberra club, he said. Most people could learn to ride a unicycle within two or three months, but playing unicycle hockey might take about 12 months. ‘‘Anything you can do on a bicycle you can do on a unicycle, including mountain biking, long-distance races, freestyle tricks and playing basketball,’’ Mr Lambert said. ‘‘It’s different, it’s low cost, the equipment is easy to throw in the back of the car, and there’s variety. Usually for most people it’s about going along and trying a bit of everything.’’ A series of professional and recreational cycling events was held over the three days of the Brindabella Challenge, which organisers hoped would become an annual event. More than $30,000 in prize money was up for grabs, and thousands of people participated over the weekend.

527

Good to see southern hemisphere representation.
Even if they still can’t spell UniHoki…

528

Yeah, and I really like the reporter’s name, too.

529

One wheel in common . . .Well-balanced pupils riding wave of popularity
By Glenn Conway
396 words
19 December 2005
Otago Daily Times
English
© Copyright 2005 Allied Press Limited. All Rights Reserved.

Forget PlayStation and mobile phones - the latest craze at Milton Primary School is an old-fashioned balancing act.

Unicycling is making a major impact in the schoolyard, thanks largely to caretaker Glenn Wilson and an enthusiastic group of pupils keen to impress their friends.

One-wheeled wonders have taken over the playground and become a must-have item.

The craze started earlier this year when a travelling unicyclist performed at the school. Afterwards, Mr Wilson, who rode unicycles as a child, hopped on one and impressed the pupils so much he was besieged with orders.

Happy to oblige, he began making unicycles out of old bicycles.

Nik McIntosh was the first in line and within a few weeks, he was the proud owner of the school’s first official unicycle.

‘‘I gave it to him and didn’t see Nik with it until about a month later when he turned up to school riding it. I was amazed,’’ Mr Wilson said.

Their popularity grew and pupils in the senior classes were soon ordering their own unicycles.

Yesterday, the courtyard was full of unicycle-riding pupils. Some can even multi-task. One girl can play her violin while riding around while another happily dribbles a basketball while pedalling.

Mr Wilson has been ‘‘blown away’’ by their popularity and the skill levels of the pupils.

‘‘Depending on your ability, it can take about a month’s practice to get confident, but I know one pupil was up and away within three days.’’

Principal Bryan Freeman was just as enthusiastic, saying the craze gave pupils a novel way of exercising and improving their balance and co-ordination.

These magnificent pupils and their cycling machines even have a leading role in the school’s end-of-year assembly this afternoon, when they will escort Santa Claus into the school grounds for the festivities.

Doubtless, the jolly red gentleman will be asked to deliver some one-wheeled gifts on Christmas morning.

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Freewheelin’ daredevils ; Extreme mountain unicyclists take on rough terrain for ridiculously difficult fun.
DEIRDRE FLEMING Staff Writer
1399 words
18 December 2005
Portland Press Herald
FINAL
K1
English
Copyright © 2005 ProQuest Information and Learning. All rights reserved.

Got boulder? This is the weekly thought for mountain bike unicyclists Kaycee and Brian Stevens and Matt Sirocki of Scarborough High School.

They pedal, they lift off their seats, they pull their wheels off the ground onto rock formations, over logs, up onto wooden bridges, and from boulder to boulder, freewheelin’ it like an X-Games halftime show.

These three Scarborough rough riders are among only about a dozen such one-wheeled daredevils in Maine, Kaycee Stevens said.

They may have started as members of a whimsical after-school circus program known as Scarborough’s Gym Dandies, but these off- road, stump-soaring riders are also part of a rare niche: extreme mountain unicyclists.

They are also called all-terrain unicycles or even UMX, just like BMX.

What might appear crazy to spectators is second nature to these off-road riders who travel to Bradbury Mountain and along Scarborough’s wooden trails - riding one wheel.

“It’s better than other sports,” said enthusiast Brian Stevens, 12.

What they do is ridiculously difficult, but, for them, it’s merely a question of seeing something in the landscape that looks interesting and trying to ride up, over or on it.

A boulder appears, or a ditch filled with logs, and they ride over or through it.

Generally, mountain unicycling is bigger out West, said John Foss in California. Foss is the “Uni-Cyclone,” who runs a mountain unicycle event in southern California each summer.

Foss has been bringing together groups of unicyclists who do big- boulder, mountain-cliff stunts for 10 years.

“There are, depending on the activity, 100 or 1,000 mountain unicyclists in the country. We got 150 at the Moab Winter Festival in March this year,” Foss said. “That was a record number of off- road riders.”

For some members of the International Unicycle Federation, the Olympics is the end goal. Today there are 50 countries with unicycle organizations.

But for most, like Kaycee and Brian Stevens, it’s just enjoying a sport that is whimsical, difficult and different. Learning to ride a unicycle usually takes somewhere from four to eight hours or more, Foss said.

“It’s really kind of in the mind, how bad you want it. I’ve seen people ride it in 15 minutes. But they’re like mutants,” Foss said. WHAT’S SO DANDY?

The Stevens brothers and Sirocki all learned to ride a unicycle in the Gym Dandies, and it was there that instructor Jon Cahill emphasized the need for safety equipment.

Cahill, a physical education teacher at Scarborough’s Wentworth Intermediate School, dubbed his after-school circus community the Gym Dandies back in 1981.

Cahill now has 230 children in grades three through 12 who ride unicycles in the school gym. He does not discourage the mountain unicyclists from exploring the off-road version of the sport on their own time, but he does not encourage the activity or recruit for it.

The group was led by Kaycee Stevens, and his friends and younger brother followed him.

“Extreme unicycling is not part of what we do,” Cahill said. “They’ve taken it to a whole new level.”

What the Gym Dandies do is tough enough.

Try riding a unicycle for 20 minutes, and see if you get an inch.

Cahill tried to teach a new unicycle rider a week ago, offering a wide-seat, thick-tire uni bike, and a school auditorium stage as a backdrop.

Outfitting the rider in full body pads, Cahill held her hand.

Then the seat was pulled out just enough to position the body behind it and rolled in under the rider’s rump, where the seat and rider were lifted up onto the uni bike.

Cahill coached: Keep the center of gravity firmly down on the seat, keep pedaling to avoid falling back, and, if all goes well, don’t stop.

The first six or seven attempts, the rider fell off. The seat popped out in front. The feet hit the floor.

Again, this sister-sport to mountain biking was explored: eight, nine, 10 times.

All the while, 8-, 9-, 10- and 11-year-olds were wheeling by, rolling and juggling like tiny jesters mocking the novice attempting what seemed more and more unfathomable.

Finally, with the help of Cahill’s right hand, the novice reached a black line 4 feet away.

But several more tries brought the rider no closer to this new Finish Line.

Cahill just smiles and offers with encouragement - and some hopes of recruitment: “You’re a unicyclist!”

The Dandies’s coach is proud of his 230 students who have appeared in the Thanksgiving Day Parade in New York City and the Independence Day parade in Washington, D.C.

In the elementary school’s bright gym, Bridget Diphilippo, an 8- year-old novice, shows the skills mastered by these whirling unibike wizards, even at an early stage.

After just a month of learning, she takes Cahill’s hand and cycles with some ease several feet, until she starts to fall backward.

No worries. The Gym Dandies even make falling look easy.

Diphilippo leans back and, like a human frog flipped inside out, falls on the gym floor as smartly as a longjumper falling back in the sand.

She’s back on the unicycle in minutes.

OFF ROAD

The Dandies ride for many hours a week. To master a unicycle, you need to, Cahill said.

“Every adult needs to put in (hours of practice each) week just to do the basics,” Cahill said. “Kids that excel are those that go out and buy their own unicycle and practice at home. There are 70 in the advanced group.”

Cahill has 100 unicyclists, more than 60 who ride 6-foot unicycles.

Only about four or five ride off road, down mountains, over logs, through streams.

“The older kids ride down mountains, over hills and banisters. They are way beyond me in skill level,” Cahill said.

“They ride out in woods, over logs, over curbs, down steps, up steps,” Cahill said. “Kaycee Stevens, he was really the one who started moving into that. His leadership has led other kids.”

Even though the mountain riders go out on their own time, Cahill badgers them to wear hard pads over their knees, elbow pads and wrist guards.

Unlike the regular Dandies, the mountain unicyclists wear pads all the way down their shins, and they have pads for their entire lower arms.

Oddly, Kaycee Stevens doesn’t ride a skateboard or snowboard. He downhill skis but has never attempted any alpine stunts.

The unicycle changed him. Now he’s a stuntman extraordinaire.

“I just had a regular unicycle. One day, I was trying to hop up some steps. I jumped down one of them and the unicycle broke. I went online to look for a replacement and found other people who do mountain unicycle. That’s what got me into it,” said Stevens, who has never been seriously injured and competed in mountain unicycle events in Toronto last summer.

Now Stevens has six unicycles.

Last summer, he went to Utah to ride in Moab Canyonlands and Arches national parks, a mountain bike and hiking destination.

At 16, the world of mountain unicycling has only just opened for him.

“We basically are doing things that people wouldn’t normally think you could do on a unicycle,” Stevens said.

Staff Writer Deirdre Fleming can be contacted at 791-6452 or at:

dfleming@pressherald.com

MOUNTAIN UNICYCLING FOR MORE INFORMATION on Gym Dandies, Maine’s youth unicycle circus, go to www.gymdandies.org. Or call Scarborough teacher Jon Cahill at Wentworth Intermediate School. FOR MORE INFORMATION on Mountain Unicycling, or M Uni, UMX, go to: http:// www.unicycling.com/muni/index.htm

Caption: Staff photos by John Ewing Tree roots across a woods trail create a challenge for extreme mountain unicyclists Kaycee Stevens, left, Matt Sirocki and Brian Stevens. The three are members of Scarborough’s Gym Dandies but have taken unicycling to a new level. The Stevens brothers are active extreme mountain unicyclists. They got their start on unicycles with the Gym Dandies, an after-school circus program in Scarborough. Brian Stevens, 12, navigates over branches on a trail in Scarborough. Kaycee Stevens, 16, nails a jump on his unicycle.

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http://www.journalnow.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=WSJ/MGArticle/WSJ_BasicArticle&c=MGArticle&cid=1128768843914

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Said article:

Wednesday, December 21, 2005
No Time to Pause: Award-winning PE teacher keeps going and going

By James Romoser
JOURNAL REPORTER

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Ashley Barnhardt and classmates go through their paces during unicycle-team practice at Shady Grove Elementary School.
(Journal Photo by Jason Arthurs)

ADVANCE

At a recent practice of Shady Grove Elementary School’s unicycle team, Karen Umberger didn’t have her whistle.

Not that it mattered. Umberger, the school’s PE teacher and athletics guru, simply used her voice.

“Tweet!” she cried, signaling a change in formation.

“Inside reverse! First partners! Tweet! Reverse!”

Like a human kaleidoscope, 20 young unicyclists unfurled into synchronized spirals and fluid figure-8s. Their balance was nearly perfect.

Not many elementary schools have their own unicycle squad. But Shady Grove has two - a unicycle club, for beginners, and a more advanced unicycle team, which performs at local colleges and in parades.

Umberger does more than train unicyclists. That’s just one extracurricular component of a robust physical-education program that was recently named the best in the state.

Every student at Shady Grove takes 25 or 30 minutes of PE every day. In a school with an enrollment of about 650 students, that means Umberger teaches 12 classes a day.

Plus, she runs an assortment of after-school activities, including the unicycle team and club, a jump-rope team and a jump-rope club, and a physical-education club. She organizes physical-education field trips: bowling, hiking, ice-skating, skiing. And she spearheaded a voluntary home-fitness program that encourages students to develop an exercise routine and record it on a calendar.

Umberger, 55, a fitness nut whose day begins with a 5:30 a.m. workout, never seems to get tired.

“Early on, I try to stress being active,” she said, describing her attitude as a PE teacher. “I usually don’t do a lot of talking. I get them moving right away. Moving’s what it’s all about.”

Her students take that philosophy and run with it.

During one recent afternoon class, 60 third-graders rushed into the school’s gymnasium and instantly filed into 12 razor-straight lines. Everyone got quiet for Umberger to make the day’s announcements. After some warm-up laps around the gym, they settled into a circle to play a game called “monster ball.” It involved four teams, a giant beach ball and lots of excited shrieking every time the ball was in the air.

Umberger, who is in her 19th year teaching PE at Shady Grove, has a voice like a bullhorn and a knack for keeping 60 hyper third-graders organized and attentive. She knows the name of every kid at Shady Grove. She has to - every kid has PE class with her every day.

“When I first came here,” she said, “I told them I wanted everyday physical education as long as I was capable of doing it.”

Her principal at the time and fellow teachers supported the idea. And she has kept it up, even as the rising number of students has increased the number of classes she has to teach as well as the number of students in each class. She says she couldn’t do it without her assistant, Sandra Smith.

Cary M. Powers, the principal of Shady Grove, said that the vigorous PE program has a big effect on the school outside the walls of the gym.

“Physical activity promotes academic excellence,” Powers said. “The theory that a healthy body and an active body creates a healthy and an active mind - I think there’s a lot of validity to that.”

Umberger certainly agrees. She equates good sportsmanship with good citizenship, and she takes pride that very few of her students are overweight. Her PE activities, she says, carry over into every area of her students’ lives.

For that reason, she hates when people call her a “gym teacher.”

“I can’t teach the gym to do anything,” she said. “I teach physical education. The gymnasium is my classroom, but I teach the whole child.”

Despite the relationship between fitness and mental alertness, many schools are cutting back on PE classes as they try to meet strict academic requirements under the federal No Child Left Behind legislation, according to Ron Morrow, an expert on physical education.

Morrow is the executive director of the North Carolina Alliance for Athletics, Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance. His agency chose Shady Grove last month as having the best PE program for an elementary school.

“If a child is physically active - usually 30 minutes each and every day - then they’re going to learn better,” Morrow said. “They’re not going to miss as much school. They’re going to be more productive.”

Umberger has known that for years. Watching over a unicycle practice, she explained that unicycling often appeals to students who aren’t naturally athletic.

“They have that mental desire to accomplish something. They’re driven,” she said. And as she said it, a team of one-wheeled wonders twirled across the gym is precise formation, without so much as a wobble.

• James Romoser can be reached at 727-7284 or at jromoser@wsjournal.com

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Downhill Cycling, Minus One Wheel - Ny Times, Sunday Business

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/12/25/business/yourmoney/25goods.html
Downhill Cycling, Minus One Wheel
By BRENDAN I. KOERNER
Published: December 25, 2005

SIMPLY balancing atop a unicycle looks impressive enough to people who have never tried one-wheeled locomotion. So the mind boggles at the exploits of Kris Holm, whose hobby is unicycling down mountainsides, leaping over any boulders, culverts and logs he encounters along the way. Mr. Holm’s most daring forays have included a plunge down Mexico’s highest volcano, El Pico de Orizaba, and a unicycling trek through the Himalayas.

None of these feats, Mr. Holm said, would have been possible on the sort of unicycles favored by circus clowns and street performers. “From 1986 to 1998, I rode on retrofitted standard unicycles,” said Mr. Holm, a geologist in Vancouver, British Columbia. “I took the unicycles with the biggest, knobbiest tires I could find. But I found that they were totally inadequate in terms of strength.”

He inadvertently destroyed more than a dozen unicycles during that period, shredding the tires and battering the frames beyond repair.

Rather than continue to waste money on bikes built for the big top, not the mountains, Mr. Holm decided to design his own unicycle: the Freeride. The initial model, which cost him about $2,500 to build, was made of steel - plenty tough, but a burden to transport. The 2005 Freeride, by contrast, has an aluminum alloy frame and weighs less than 15 pounds.

“It’s basically been a constant evolution,” said Mr. Holm, who redesigns the Freeride every six months, sending his sketches and notes to the Chinese factory where the unicycles are produced. Prototypes are then shipped to Vancouver, where Mr. Holm tests them in the rugged countryside.

Mountain unicycles - or munis, in the sport’s lingo - are instantly recognizable by their thick tires, and the Freeride is no exception; its tire is three inches wide and studded with rubber grips. The other differences between a Freeride and a clown’s unicycle, however, are harder to spot with an untrained eye. Chief among them is the comfortable, curvaceous seat, intended to spare a muni rider any unpleasant soreness.

“It has dual-density foam, and a better-quality material for the removable seat cover,” said Mr. Holm, whose posterior suffered through several years of muni riding on hard-as-rock saddles. The front of the seat also has a handle that muni riders grip for balance while hopping over obstacles.

The forked section that connects the Freeride’s frame to the wheel was also designed with the hazards of unicycling in mind. Mr. Holm said that on many unicycles, the forks jut out near the rider’s knees, causing frequent scrapes and falls. So the fork on the Freeride was built to curve slightly inward near the top, to reduce the likelihood of interfering with pedaling legs.

Mr. Holm acknowledges that mountain unicycling remains a nascent sport, and that his sales have been commensurately small; he estimates that he has sold 2,000 to 3,000 Freerides since the product’s introduction in 1998.

Many of his sales have come through Unicycle.com, a site that specializes in all manner of one-wheeled machines, from munis to unicycles designed for beginners. The Freeride is one of the site’s most expensive products: the 2005 base model costs $520, and that’s without a brake. (Adding a hydraulic brake increases the price by $179.)

Given Mr. Holm’s habit of updating the Freeride twice a year, the initial 2006 model should be available by early spring. Mr. Holm declined to reveal how it would improve on the current version. “If I give out too many details,” he said, “nobody will want to buy the old thing.”

Consumers cursed with less-than-perfect equilibrium, of course, will probably steer clear of either version.

534

While the text mentions fish on b*cycles, even the pic’s title is unambiguous.

(http://www.obvious.fsnet.co.uk/fisholympics/fishmonocycle.jpg)

fishmonocycle.jpg

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Actually, no they wont, they’ll just take a bit longer to learn than others.

Cathy

536

http://www.stuff.co.nz/stuff/0,2106,3525657a1861,00.html

537

This article about Manchaster United contained 1x the word unicycle:

“Who cares if United spent the second half back-pedalling more furiously than a clown on a unicycle, it takes both attack and defence to win a game.”