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The first time I ever touched a unicycle was the summer after I
graduated from high school. I had heard many stories about how my
uncle could ride, and this summer, my sister and I asked him if we
could borrow it.
Learning to ride on this 20-some year old unicycle was fun
because we knew several relatives had also learned to ride on this
very one. The first time I got on it, I had two shoulders to hold
onto, and one person also held the seat in place. I wondered how I
was ever going to be able to stay upright on the thing!
My sister and I took turns practicing. We found a great place
to start learning: a tennis court. We would ride around the inside
of the court, holding onto the fence with one hand and a shoulder
with the other. We practiced for a couple hours, and by the end of
the evening, we were able to ride by just touching the fence for
balance every few inches or feet.
After that, we tried riding by only hanging onto one person's
shoulder. My sister and I took turns riding around the block while
the other one walked for support.
Eventually, we got brave enough to push off and go by ourselves for a short distance.
It helped to ride with a shoulder to hang onto first, then letting go.
We were very proud when, after seven days of practicing, we could
ride for 15-30 feet alone.
We just kept improving from there. We got to be quite good at
riding; the only part we needed help on was mounting. We had to use
either a person or a fence or a tree to actually get on the
unicycle, then we could ride. It took a lot of practice to learn to
free mount, but I desperately wanted to do it. Sometimes I practiced
for half an hour at a time strictly on mounting. Once in a while, I
would get up and get moving! One day I mounted 21 times during my
hundreds of attempts. Gradually I perfected my skill until I could
get on in the first three to five tries. Then it took one or two.
Now I almost always mount the first time I try. It's extremely
rewarding to be completely independent of any help to mount and ride.
We also practiced turning. First wide turns in the street, then
tighter and tighter turns until we could turn corners on sidewalks.
During the summer, we came into contact with others who could
ride. The two sons of our neighbors up the street wowed us with their amazing unicycling abilities. They gave us some good ideas for stunts to try, and let us ride their six-foot giraffe unicycle. By the end of the summer, we could juggle for about half a block, weave between obstacles, pick up pop bottles while riding, do u-turns and ride in complete circles, ride backwards for a short distance, execute small jumps mid-ride, go down six-inch curbs, and do spins. We even succeeded in riding the giraffe unicycle.
My sister and I also managed to recruit three of our friends to
try unicycling. Using our uncle's uni, two borrowed unis from our
neighbors, and two that we bought for ourselves that summer, we
taught others how to ride. We discovered a fun and helpful way to
teach others: have the inexperienced unicyclist ride in the middle
of two experienced people. That way, everyone is on a uni and going
the same pace, and the middle person has support. Then when the
middle rider wished to go alone, she would just let go. It worked
well, and it was fun to ride around in a group of four five
unicyclists. We attracted quite a lot of attention.
I find unicycling to be a unique and fun hobby. There is
always something new to try: new mounts, riding on your stomach,
walking the wheel.... We are willing to try new things all the time. Unicycling is good exercise as well, and more fun than biking.
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