UniNoob day three, hour 2, made it outside for the first time.
Wind and an almost busted toe do not help but I think its a bit of progress from the other day.
Yes my seat is too low, its as high as it can go, getting a new seat post for this and a 24" uni soon as well.
Advice welcomed, Enjoy!
Not bad! I suggest you do more practise and make less videos, although it will be nice to look back on your old footage in a few weeks and see how hard you made it look compared to how easy it will be. Do another 8 hours practise and it will be a lot more familiar. It seemed like on your best attempts you were going quite fast. Maybe slow down just a little bit and try to concentrate on being steady and in control. Keep up the good work!
Well done on becoming hooked- I hope you will inspire others too, and you will eventually not have to ride alone.
wait.
is this the 2nd hour on day 3. Or the 3rd day but only your 2nd hour of riding?
Day 3 or 4, Someone gave me this Uni a few days ago, maybe Tusday or so? About 3-5 hours total practice, all of which was inside my small basement going forward and backwards a crank or to at a time.
This was my first time outside where I had more than 10 feet to work with.
What tire pressure do you reccommend? I feel like I get stuck and cant crank if I go slower, I think its mostly due to the low level of my seat and cramped knees
Wow. You’re doing a great job. Definitely get that new seat post (400mm length I hope) and put it on. As for tire pressure, a steel rim with a good lip and a cheap tire will support 50% over the recommended pressure. For a 20"x1.75" tire like yours I would normally say run it at 60 psig because it’s probably rated to 40 psig. But you have the JuggleBug 20" plastic mag rim which has almost no lip. Tubes like to creep out under the tire on those. Then they make a really loud noise and don’t work very well. But tubes are cheap so go ahead and experiment. High pressure is your friend but not as much a friend as a properly adjusted saddle height.
o nice, yeh u r doing pretty good, i remember when i first got mine, i think i put in about 6 hours a day for the first 4 days lol, And by the end i was getting around 50 ft a time,
For tire pressure, it all depends on what feels comfotable for you. For me I dont like it to high becus when you hop u cant hop to good, but not to low that u hit the rim when doing a drop.
But dont take my advice, i wuld ask someone else, i havnt ridden my unicycle in like 3 months lol. idk y i still even post here 
I think it’s wonderful you posted this.
Know why?
Because every single one of us has gone through what you’re going through now.
And when I watched you, I remembered what it was like for me.
And I’d forgotten how frustrating it was.
And how tiring.
And how annoying.
Your video made me smile big time.
You’re doing very well for such a short time learning.
The only advice I can give is ‘keep at it’.
You’ll get there.
definetly frustrating, definetly tiring/exahusting. I remeber i lost 10 pounds in my first 2 weeks, and i wasnt even to try to lose weight lol
dont mean to bump this thread but it was already bumped to the top, here is a more recent vid from yesterday, and tonight I forced myself to go to the end of the block and back twice, freemounting the whole time. It took me a half an hour and my quads are shot
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o7ys-70NAuM&feature=channel_page
hahaha thats pretty cool! I get to ride finally in 2 more weeks. I cant wait!!
Thanks for posting the footage. I’ve been trying to practice during my breaks at work, so progress has been slow. You’re way ahead of me in skill. 
I got to work a half hour early (by accident - couldn’t sleep), so I tried practicing during that time. I took a couple of good spills, and made the stupid mistake of trying to break my fall with my hand. The pain will remind me to roll with the fall, instead of trying to stop myself. ::sigh:: I’ll get there!
The quads should relax a bit more when you get the longer seatpost. Squatting down seems more intense on your muscles- which might be why George Peck recommends when you can ride seat out to do Squat riding (riding as low as possible).
I also have a unicycle with an even shorter seatpost! Less far to fall is not necessarily easier!
My first unicycle was much like yours. I have an ancient photo of it from 1996, complete with stupid plastic seatpost cover thingy, and cottered cranks, and plastic rim. At the time it was all I had to choose from as none of the bike shops stocked unicycles and when I found one that could order one there was no choice but red and short.
Yeah, Rowan I still have the plastic seatpost thingy too, Im am deff not hating on this Uni, it was free and has gotten me pretty far in a week, the new seatpost should arrive anyday (fingers crossed its here today). Thanks for the cool pics.
And for ckanode , I am well trained in the art of falling, I have fallen literally 1000’s of times on bicycles and had a few major motorcycle crashes.
I almost lost my right leg in 2004. I got 50+ staples but didnt break anything.
Also I am wearing motorcycle gloves with Scaphoid bone padding in the palm, Im a guitarist and cant afford to hurt them.
I would say the keys to not getting hurt in a fall are
1)practice bailing
2)save yourself and dont worry about the uni getting hurt
3)while learning bail athe first instance of instability rather than getting hurt trying to go an extra crank, thats when I find myself falling harder
The quad pain is mostly from the freemounting I started doing on Sunday so Im sure it wont last long, I also have been working on freemounting with the opposite feet to ease the pain and even the muscles.
I had ordered a UNi but canceled because I felt I should see what I want to do first.
Will a 24 inch Uni be bad for street stuff? I don’t think Ill be into serious trials or anything but am interested in some hopping and will be riding about 5 miles to work once in a while when I get up to it. And light trail riding (Muni?) too.
Also I see a lot of riders with the middle of there foot placed on the pedals rather than closer to the ball which is how I ride a bicycle.
What is the preferred foot placement for the different Uni disciplines?
Yeah, I just need to remember the art of falling from MA training years ago. I’ve got some rollerblade wrist guards, so I’ll start wearing those. Most of my falls have been on my feet. The two spills that I had today were not typical.
My brother has been a motorcross participant for years, and he’s gotten pretty lucky with his accidents. He hasn’t had an accident like the one you described, but he’s come pretty close. He’s ripped his elbow open pretty bad when doing a wheelie and the tire blew out. Flipped the bike and had the back tire hit his face (thank goodness for a full-face helmet). Ran into a cable (fortunately it hit him in his sternum, instead of neck). And that’s only to name a few.
Very good tips on staying safe!
If you are interested in hopping and MUni then I suggest getting a 24x3" MUni. Some riders can do some pretty awesome trials on a 24 although the trend is to use a smaller wheel lately. Kris Holm used to appear in a lot of videos doing trials on a 24" MUni. I find smaller wheels very limiting in speed- so instead of replacing my stolen 24" with another 24", I got myself a KH 29er because I think I like fast paced muni best, although with the 29 you definitely sacrifice some of the bouncyness that you would get from the 3" wide tire.
Foot placement varies a bit with rider preference. I like to do most of my riding with the balls of my feet on the pedals. Occasionally, when I need some extra stability (well back when I used tramping boots for MUni) I would put the arch of my foot on the pedal, up against the heel of the boot, for going over bumpy ground that is more likely to bump my feet off, and especially for doing drops that are over 3’. When you land a high drop- if your feet or ankles are not strong, you can feel the flex in your foot with all your weight pushing down and it pulls on the ligaments in the back of your leg or something. I remember doing a couple of big drops that kinda hurt my feet so mostly after that I would use the arches for drops.
Something I tell new riders very often is to put your feet on the pedals straight- because often the tendency is to have the ankles facing inwards a bit, and if the crank doesn’t knock your feet off the pedals it can take a bite out of your ankle. So feet on the pedals straight is probably more important at first than fore and aft placement- then over time you should find what is comfortable and works for you!
I was going to suggest the ball of the foot helps with ankling but after looking it up it seems like it could be a myth so maybe I shouldn’t perpetuate it- that’s something I’ve read from other riders in the forum and probably repeated it.
I’ll agree wholeheartedly with the first one, but I don’t think the second one is good in more than a handful of situations(a dismount whilst learning is one of those situations;), another is if you have sharp bolts under your seat, and the last I can think of is complete and utter wipe-out).
The third “key” really doesn’t apply to unicycling at all. Learning to recover from all kinds of instability is key, and you can walk/run out of most uni bails anyway.
This is much easier if you don’t have a 50lb backpack on 
Agreed, but Im talking complete beginners like I was last week.
I just made it up and down my block twice freemounting and only had a bout 10 UPDs. Im very excited
