Ouch

Last Saturday whilst trying to outdo a 12 year old on his unicycle (never a good idea) trying to bunny hop a kerb I fell off and landed heavily on my right elbow... Youch, that hurt...! I only pulled up my sleeve an hour later and diiscovered an inch long deep gash just below my elbow. Should have really gone to casualty to get it stitched up but couldn't be bothered to wait hours and muck up everyone's weekend!

Oh well... moral of the story - never compete with someone 32 years my junior!

Going backwards...

Not much to say really apart from I'm slowly learning how to go backwards... And what's the point of that I hear you ask? Good question. Because I can, I suppose!

10 miles non a unicycle...

As I was reading the Weekend section of Saturday's Daily Telegraph at 9.30 yesterday morning I came across an article about unicycling, and in it it mentioned there was a sponsored unicycle ride between Bristol and Bath (along the cycleway) on Sunday starting at 10am. Clearly there was no way I was going to make the start, but I hatched a cunning plan and drove to Bitton Station leaving my two wheeled bike locked up at the finish so that I'd have a way of getting back to the car without having to unicycle the 6-7 miles back to Bitton!

Anyway, I got to Bitton Station and established that a large group of unicyclists [1] hadn't passed by yet, so had time for a coffee and some chocolate before deciding to ide towards Bristol to meet up with the group. I probably did about two miles before I bumped into them, taking about 30 mins, then promptly turned round and headed back to Bitton. After a short stop there we carried on and eventually got into Bath at about 2pm. So I reckon I unicycled about 10-11 miles, just short of the full 14 miles I would have done if I'd done the whole route. Ant that's about 10 or 11 times further than I've ever unicycled before so I was pretty chuffed!

Read more about it here: www.bristoltobathonaunicycle.co.uk


[1] What is the collective noun for unicyclists?

First post for a while...

Well, I've been on the unicycle quite a lot recently - being able to idle has made it much easier just to hop on and practice more idling AND pogoing on our patio. I can still only do right foot down idling, but I've also learnt how to pogo, which is a laugh! Need to just be a bit more controlled so that I can hop up and down small kerbs...

That's all for now folks!

Getting there!

Well after a couple of hours of non-stop practice over the weekend I reckon I've almost cracked it - well at least as far as right foot down idling goes... Must work on the other foot now...

A big push to get idling sussed...

Well after months of procrastination I'm really making an effort to crack this idling lark! After two focussed 15 minutes sessions my best idle is now up to about 5 seconds! Wow, I can tell you're impressed! After trying it in the local park by practicing next to some swings (where I could hold on to the uprights) I decided I wasn't getting anywhere, so now I'm just doing it straight from free starts. This has the added benefit of improving my free starts! Anyway, I reckon after another half an hour or so I should be getting there. Famous last words!

Me unicycling in the snow

Me unicycling in the snow
Originally uploaded by timpent.

Well I haven't been on the unicycle in ages but this was too good an opportunity to miss! About 2-3" of snow fell in an hour... Great fun :-)