I went for a uni ride up the Water of Leith, after (bi)cycling it last night to see the flooding. I went as far as Roseburn before climbing up to the cycling paths and then heading north to the Granton gas storage thing, then east past the harbour before heading back south on the cycle paths to Cannonmills. A grand total of 8 miles, with a good bit of slow riding, hopping and a few attempts at one-footed riding.
Steering
I made more progress in my attempts to do Proper Wheelies this morning. I was riding up a slight incline, and manage to do a wee bit of steering correct whilst the wheel was up in the air. Normally, I just veer to the side and bail. The magic difference this time was that I was looking far into the distance, rather than staring at my front wheel.
Steering is funny like that. It works best when you don’t think about it. Just look where you want to do and you end up naturally doing corrections to keep you in that direction – even whilst on one wheel, it seems. It works the other way around too. It’s really hard to not steer towards something you’re looking at – target fixation.
Wheelies like a jet taking off
There’s an item which has remained stubbornly unticked on my life ‘todo’ list for a long time – learning to (properly) wheelie on a bicycle. I’m not talking about popping the front wheel up into the air for a second. i mean a proper stable wheelie-as-long-as-you-want affair. Given that I can now ride a unicycle, it seems somewhat inconsistent that I still can’t do this.
One thing which unicycling has taught me is that stubborn persistence reaps rewards. If you actually put in the hours of practise, and refuse to give up then eventually … eventually .. things will start to click into place. For me, wheelies definitely fall into this category. I think I’ve done four hour-long practise sessions now. Each time, little bits start to come together and make more sense. On the first time, I realised that there was a transition into a more stable balance point when you get the wheel high enough. On the second time, I realised that raising the front wheel purely via pedal power (and no pulling on the bars) stopped me falling to the side. On the third time, I realised that you’ve only got a half-pedal stroke in which to apply enough torque to get the wheel up and so you need a big burst rather than a steady push. And finally tonight, I realised that dragging your brakes and letting them go just at the start of the pedal downstroke means you spend the whole downstroke at maximum torque as opposed to ramping up to max torque – just like what jumbo jets do when they spin up their engines with the brakes on before takeoff.
I can occasionally manage to wheelie for maybe 10 metres, so I’ve not totally nailed it yet but I’m getting there. Just need more practise.
Top tips:
– Read this article. It speaks the truth. You don’t need to precompress suspension, or do any big pre-transfer of your weight.
– Lift the front wheel by pedal power, not by arm power. You need a sudden burst of pedal power. Pedal against your brakes so that you’re really having to force the pedals round, then release the brakes for a sudden surge. If you find yourself falling to one side immediately, make sure you’re not doing arm-pulling.
– I used middle chain ring and either lowest or second-lowest gears. Anything higher and you don’t have the leverage to rotate the bike.
– Have your seat at a normal height to allow you to pedal normally. Sit toward the back of the seat, but you don’t need to be hanging off the back (unlike doing a manual, where you don’t have pedal-power to rotate the bike).
– Do this a million time until you start to get familiar with how the bike balances with the wheel up in the air.
Accidental epic
I accidentally did a 10.3 mile ride today. I really just meant to go out and practise balancing, but I found a new path down through Granton. Once I got to Granton, I thought I may as well ride along the shore rather than go back up any hills. I rode through the industrial estate, crossing sideroads by riding off kerbs and hopping up the other side. That lead eventually to the Esplanade. It’s a good place to ride, so I practised mini-idles, hops, and rolling hops. I carried right along until I got to Cramond. The choice was then between riding up the dull and steep hill, or continuing along the River Almond on offroad trails. Easy choice! Lots of mud and puddles and bumps to keep things interesting. This took me to Cramond Brig. Now I had another choice. Rather than head home through Drylaw, I phoned to arrange to meet family for lunch in South Queensferry. So, i continued my ride, out through Dalmeny and down the steep hill to the Hawes Inn for lunch and a pint. A grand total of 10.3 miles!
Sun + Mud
Woo, the sun is out! But the ground is soaking from days of heavy rain.
I rode out to Ocean Terminal, riding through many many big muddy puddles by the side of the Water of Leith. My focus for the day was transitioning from riding to hopping and back – I can now do it almost without thinking. I messed about in the quiet carparks on the outskirts of Ocean Terminal – riding off kerbs, hopping up/down, standstills and 180 hop jumps.
I received two separate rounds of spontaneous applause from people walking nearby. And I had two seperate long chats with random folk – people are friendly and it’s easy to chat about uni for a while .. and usually I appreciate the resting time as well as the banter. I met a young guy who said he got a uni a few months ago – cool! And I overtook a jogger for the first time (heh).
I’ve established that the best way to mount the muni is to mount into a hop, get settled, then ride away. It works on all sorts of ground, and gives me a chance to reposition my feet properly on the spiky pedals before moving off. My balance-hops are getting smaller, more controlled and require less energy. I feel that I can correct balance by pushing outwards on the pedals a bit, rather than having to do a full hop. I managed some 180-hops off kerbs today, and tried hard to stay on the uni when things got wobbly by hopping rather than stepping off. I also nearly made it up the steep, steep hill after the railway bridge – I got all the way up to the sharp right-hander and bottled it.
Really enjoyable day, and lovely to see the sun out!
Politics
Today, I rode the Pedal on Paliament ride on the muni. This morning I wasn’t quite sure if I could manage it, but I tried anyway and it was fine! There were thousands of cyclists there – stretching from the library all the way back to Melville Drive and then along the road some. It was all a bit stop/start near the beginning – which is very hard on a uni – and having lots of people around made freemounts twice as tough as normal. But once we got down the Royal Mile things flowed more freely, although long downhills are .. you guessed it … pretty hard on a unicycle. Still, lots of fun and a nice sunny day for it.
Commuter
I unicycled to/from work today, just cos. The first part was fine – along cycle paths, parks and quiet streets. But when I got closer to the city centre, it was just too busy to get much riding in. I rode the old smaller-wheel’d uni for the first time in weeks. It’s lighter and faster responding but I didn’t want to do any kerb-hopping on it lest I break it again. On the way home it was raining, but still managed to ride a fair bit of the way. I’m finding that rolling mounts are actually easier than static mounts, and the lighter uni makes it easy to get on and off quickly.
I am muni
I realised that the offroad paths near my flat were no longer presenting any real difficulty, and I needed to set my sights higher. It was a lovely sunny afternoon so I drove out to Cramond Brig and rode Dalmeny Estate. From the carpark, I followed the trail north until it reached the water, and then through the woods at the shore – up and down over stones, ruts, muddy puddles and such like. Once I reached the crossroads with the layby, I headed southeast past the farmhouses, over the hill and back onto the main path back to Cramond Brig. Total distance of about 3.5 miles.
It was really good (but tricky) fun. Riding along on rough-ish ground is easy enough, although you need to be constantly adapting to the bumps. I ended up riding through puddles just to mix things up a bit. When the paths get muddier and more rutted, your options are dramatically narrowed. I’d often ride up a potential-energy dead end, stall and have to step off. Actually, afterwards I realised I should’ve switched to hopping more. When mounting on rough ground, I found it much easier to mount into a hop, get my feet adjusted right, and then ride off. I’m getting the hang of riding up steeper hills – I found that doing a half-pedal, then balancing, then another half pedal works on the really steep stuff. Going down actually seems harder than going up, but I learned that holding onto the seat makes it easier to resist the pedal’s tendency to lift you up off the uni.
Rar, mud and munis and sunny days!
10,000 hours
I think I was riding for three hours today – uni is an awesomely addictive hobby and a great escape. One hour or so in the morning down at Cramond – enough riding and freemounts to start getting properly used to the new muni, plus some hopping practise up and down a staircase next to the beach. In the afternoon, I rode out to Ocean Terminal and practised riding off kerbs, riding off kerbs avec grande vitesse, hopping up kerbs and my first attempts to rolling hops (ie. riding forward and launching up into a forward jump). I tried about ten times and landed it properly once … for an airborne journey of about a foot!
It’s always fun trying new hard stuff, because the other stuff suddenly feels easier. When I’m focused on riding down drops, I don’t really think about the hundreds of freemounts and hops and little balance-recovery moments I do as setup. But they all contribute. Nowdays, 180 jumps aren’t a trick per-se .. they’re just a useful way of changing direction to set up and try another attempt at a rolling hop.
Going down kerbs fast was interesting. Going off fast is much easier than going down slowly, because there’s less of an along-down-along transition. And it’s the first time I’ve had to deal with freezing the pedals whilst in mid-air .. something that I need to nail for rolling hops.
The new muni is great. The big tyre is way bouncier than the old uni’s – great for drops. It’s way stronger too, which is good news given that I broke the old one!
Rolling mounts
Woo, I just figured out rolling mounts, and they’re pretty easy! Rolling mount is where you’re rolling the unicycle along the ground on front of you, and then you jump onto it .. without stopping it .. and ride off. It’s the antithesis of my first attempts at freemounting – I remember trying to keep everything precise, steady, measured. But actually unicycles are hardest to handle whilst stationary. So a rolling mount makes lots of sense.
Getting the timing right is the only hard bit. You’re watching for your favoured pedal to come round to about 6’oclock, and then you go and step up on it. The sudden introduction of your foot onto the pedal slows the unicycle down a bit, whilst you carry on up and over into a forward tilt. Then you ride away.
I tried this a few weeks ago, and came up with a hack to make it easier. If you start with your pedals in the optimal position for getting onto the unicycle, then walk backwards three paces (rolling the uni with you) then you’re set up perfectly for three-steps-then-mount. Doing that let me focus on the mounting part rather than the timing part.
Tonight, I nailed the timing part. You’re watching your target pedal as it comes round. Sometimes you need to do a quick little dance to get your feet into sync. But then you just hook up with the pedal as it comes round. It almost seems like the faster you go, the easier it is – the pedal carries you up and over more. I’ve just spend a while banzai’ing up and down my corridor, jumping onto the uni mid-run. Lots of fun!
I’ve also been trying seat-out riding. The difficulty is keeping an even amount of weight on each pedals through the pedal stroke. Easier said than done! But I’m starting to get the hang of it, and making less and less use of the seat as a steering-device / force-compensation-lever.