Unicycle progression

bah, ladders are for quitters

Another unicyclist here. getting about 5 m before falling. I am somewhat limited in my learning because:
1) I don't own a uni (borrowing a mates)
2) my only nice learning surface is 6 m long!

My uni is coming in a few weeks time (yay for me!), and hopefully i will gain the courage to go outside into the street (I live oposite the sportfields of a school - if there are no kids or drug dealers, there are joggers, dog walkers and skateboarders )

No pete, ladders are for midgets!

(in real soon hopefully )

Got my 24" uni now and starting to feel like I'm getting somewhere! Today I experimented a bit with letting go of my housemate's arm and at best managed 2 wheel revolutions before panicking. A small start but something to build on tomorrow

I just figured out how to freemount! now I just have to get myself to SIT on the G dammed thingy... my thighs keeps shaking after 30min pracice.

How do I get my body to learn to sit? hmm hmm

Good work on the freemounting, I feel like I'm years away from mastering that.

Yeah it's *way* easier on your legs if you sit down and relax a bit... I just told myself over and over 'sit on the seat, sit on the seat, straight back, look ahead, sit on the seat', and now I'm starting to do it automatically... as we all know, with this unicycling malarkey, practice makes perfect

I found raising the sadle until my leg was totally straight and foot on the pedal really helps.

I kept on putting my weight on my legs when i had the sadle lower down.

thanx for the tips... after my studentlunch of just noodles... I'll get out and practice!

Arrrg, dammit! Got my uni today, but have an exam on friday. damn you , temptation! damn you!

Taking it out and practising could make a nice reward system for completing revision tasks

Tonight I went out sans housemate to see what would happen... mainly what happened was I fell off a lot. Having said that, I did do better than I expected to and can get a short distance before I panic and jump off. Anyone got any suggestions for how to make myself stay on it as long as I can instead of jumping before I probably have to?

And WOFT, good luck for your exam

K___ hmmm... don't panic? I got the same problem when learning to freemount, I manage to do it sometimes, but only when I focus on not panicing. That almost resulted in a really dislocated wrist yesterday.. but I was lucky and got away with some minor ache.

yes! the more weight you put on the saddle the less your legs wibble

Seat height makes a massive difference! the uni I was borrowing had an extremely short seat (think squatting). On my (brand spanking new "made in Taiwan") uni, the higher seat means more weight on saddle (as Jem says) which means better balance which means less falls which means more time on uni which means more fun which means...*runs out of breathe*...

Approahing level 1! Yay! I can freemount 1 out of 4 times, dismount gracefully and managed to ride off my 5m strech of bricked backyard onto the lawn. 3m onto the lawn and the grass wins. I need to find a 50m strech of level road. The feeling of progress is a most wonderful feeling,,,

Level 1 almost done here to...
rides more than 50m and can dismount, I dont really now gracefully is the right term, but it ends up in front of me, and I got it under controll...

I manage the free mounting too, but it may be too few successful mounts per try to say that I can do it well.

Breakthrough! Not panicking is getting there, and I'm starting to be able to go more than a few meters unassisted Plus, some of the time I can actually deliberately stop and get off instead of just bailing!

The feeling of progress is indeed an amazing one... and btw WOFT, how did your exam go?

Thanks for asking. The exam was crap, but I can freemount If I enjoyed learning for tests as much as I am enjoying learning to uni, I wouldn't have to study!

K - Keep going at it! My main limiting thing was the thought of "falling" off all the time. When I could go a few meters, I realised that always land on my feet when i come off. I got a boost in confidence after that which helped a lot when trying to freemount. Hopefully, I will soon go for my first public outing this week. I am mentally preparing for "where's the other wheel" type comments

GET IN! Tonight I rode 25m unassisted I knew it'd feel good but I wasn't prepared for how awesome it feels going along feeling in control

That's a good point about realising you always land on your feet - I found that as well and it helped quite a lot. Guess the next thing is consistency and then freemounting...

How was the first public outing WOFT?

Yay for K! You are right - It is an awesome feeling!

I didn't go riding on monday - a sudden explosion of deadlines interupted me

It was probably for the better - I can now freemount 1 out of 2. It would be a bit silly having to go back to the "learning tree" each time i wobble

I am moving house at the end of this month - The new house has a quiet little side street. And it is flat! Very excited at having more space to learn! Not sure if it has been asked, but who has played poi on a uni (silly, I know)? My mate claims it is impossible...

Thanks for the enthusiasm WOFT

Hope the moving goes well and the side street turns out to be an ideal riding place.

Unassisted riding is improving gradually though steering still leaves a bit to be desired! Hoping that will come with time, as the rest of it seems to have done. Also starting to idly muse about unihockey - nothing like jumping in at the deep end to force the learning curve!