I spent a couple of days practicing 'Method 1,' as explained to me by
James Blackmore (his email to me is at the end of this summary - it is
a quite detailed description of 'Method 1'). I could get it started pretty
well, but I always ended up at the 'dead spot,' trying to get my left
foot on the pedal and pushing.. I never did manage it.
Following the posts by Marc Espie and Beirne Konarski, I went home and
tried the 'wheel holding variation' of 'Method 2'. YES YES YES YES!!!
This worked so well, I was mounting 5 out of 6 tries after about 10 minutes!
It's kind of funny, because I was having a hard time picturing the procedure
when I read about it. And when I explained it to my wife she said, 'Yeah,
right.' .. But in three tries I had completed a mount! Thanks again for
all the good advice - I will be sure to pass it on.
- Derek Hart.
On 3 Jul 1996, Marc Espie wrote:
> In article <31D9B2FC.4900CB8C@ald.net>,
> Beirne Konarski <beirne@neo.lrun.com> wrote:
>
> >Two methods of free mounting:
> >
> >Method #1
> >
> >Put the seat underneath you.
> >
> >Put your dominant foot on the lower pedal.
> >
> >Keeping weight on the lower pedal, step up and put your other foot
> >on the top pedal. Your foot should land on the pedal and push it back
> >to about the 9 o'clock point.
> >
> >Lean forward slightly and go forward.
>
> >
> >Method #2
> >
> >Put the seat underneath you.
> >
> >Put your dominant foot on the back pedal.
> >Set the pedals more or less horizontal. The back pedal should be at
> >about 8pm.
> >
> >Step up onto the other pedal. Keep enough weight so that the pedals
> >remain roughly horizontal.
> >
> >Lean forward slightly and go forward.
> >
> >
> >I learned with method #2, but now mostly us method #1. The second
> >method doesn't require the partial backwards ride, which makes it
> >easier at the beginning. Once you learn the first method, though,
> >it tends to be easier because you have an idle cycle to recover from
> >any awkwardness.
> >
> >This may end up as the skill file for freemounting, so I'll be glad for
> >any comments.
>
> Easier variant of method 2: put your dominant foot on the back pedal, put
> the corresponding hand on the tire, hold tight. Balance your upper body
> over the unicycle, put the other foot on the remaining pedal, straigthen up
> and start. That way, you have much more time to position your other foot
> and balance your body. Much easier for beginners.
>
> [interesting discussion of how practice relates to other skills deleted.]
[begin email from James Blackmore <jamesb@San-Jose.ate.slb.com>]
Hi Derek,
First of all, Congratulations on getting the hang of riding forwards !
You've already got past the first hurdle, by not giving up !!!
If you can ride forwards fairly predictably, then mounting is really no
big deal. Just try not to fool yourself into thinking its difficult !
(or let anyone else fool you into it !).
===)
/
/
__/
/ \ \
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| \ |
\____O/
If you stand behind the uni, with the saddle wedged under you, and
the right (assuming you mount right foot first, otherwise
reverse right/left for the rest of this) pedal pointing down
and back towards you about 1/8th of a turn from bottom, then with your
weight on your left foot, rest your right foot on this lower pedal.
Balance at this point. This bad ascii pic is supposed to show
you the approximate position of the left pedal (this uni is transparent :-),
it should actually be a little higher than this picture shows, the O
is supposed to be your right foot.
Then lean slightly to your left, and push down with your right foot, this
will make the uni roll backwards underneath you (and 'pop' you up on top).
What you want is for the uni to roll slightly behind you, so
that you are now stopped with your right foot at the bottom
of its travel, and you are leaning slightly forwards, but not too much,
this gives you time to pick up your left foot, and put it on the left pedal,
which
is at its top point, then start pedalling forwards !!
The first few tries don't even try to put your left foot on the pedal, just
see how long you can 'hang' !
When you first try to mount, the starting angle of the lower pedal will be
wrong, and either the uni will roll out behind you (so be ready)
in which case the pedal was too high up, or you will just stay
on your left foot, in which case the lower pedal was too low down,
it takes a few tries to get this right.
I think it took me about 20 attempts before I really got a feeling for
what I needed to do, and I suppose that I was managing to mount about
1 time in 3 for a while after that. The trickiest part I found was
the leaning to the left slightly, this is to offset the action
of pushing down on the right pedal.
I would suggest that you don't use a chair or any support, as they
will not really help much, just start in an open space, and keep
trying !! It won't take very long to at least understand what you need to
be doing.
-> Part of the problem may be that I have yet to ride backwards at all.
Don't even think about it, I learnt to mount before I even learned
to idle, and I have still not mastered riding backwards. If you can ride
forwards for 20ft, then you can free mount ! It just takes a few tries to
work it out !
Good luck, and keep trying.
James.
__________________________________________________________________________
/ \
| o James Blackmore |
| ,-|\, Software Engineer |
| << Schlumberger ATE, Test Sys, San Jose |
| ,+' Email: james-blackmore@slb.com |
| | Tel: 1 408 437 7208 |
| O |
\__________________________________________________________________________/
[end email from James Blackmore <jamesb@San-Jose.ate.slb.com>]