backwards

Idling and riding backwards are two closely related skills, and it's
good to learn them together.

I found it was best to find a really smooth floor (I found a juggling
club that used a gym) but a good smooth car park or drive will do.

Now, ride forwards and stop with one pedal down. What will happen is
that the pedal will rise slightly past bottom dead centre just because
of your momentum. That is good.

Allow your weight to be ever so slightly behind the uni, then push that
pedal down so that the uni passes beneath you and you can regain your
forward motion.

What you've done now is almost an idle.

Build on this sequence: ride, stop, rock back, ride forwards.

Eventually, you'll get the confidence to:
ride, stop, rock back, rock forwards, rock back, ride forwards.

And so on.

As you get more and more confident, you will find yourself able to rock
back more confidently until the pedal passes all the way through bottom
dead centre and almost up top top dead centre.

It's the "almost" that's the difficult thing!

Eventually, you'll find that you are idling for short periods (3 or 4
pumps of the pedal) and one time you will suddlenly let that pedal go
all the way over the top and you will have pedalled backwards for almost
a wheel revolution. This is a major hurdle crossed.

From here, it's just practise, practise, practise. I found it useful to
ride up to an obstacle and stop and ride backwards 2 or 3 wheel revs
before stopping and riding forwards.

So you're aiming for 3 steps forwards, 3 steps backwards, repeat.

Build from here.

And look at something fixed in the middle distance. Your brain works
better when you're focussed on something specific, a reasonable distance
away.

For riding longer distances backwards, you need to keep snap-changing
your focus to something nearer every 5 - 10 metres.

Good luck.

--
Mikefule - Roland Hope School of Unicycling

Everyone should be fatuous for 15 minutes.
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i did what mike was suggesting. and learned idiling and backwrds ridding
at the same time. maybe i suck but it took me a month before doing them
both consistently and that's with regular practice. oh yeah, a
frustrating month. frustration is involved big time. but i was
determined and that won out over frustration. then i was in the zone.

have fun,

john

--
unigeee - Hmmmmm!
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Use the same techniques you used when learning to ride. A wall/fence,
someone walking next to you, etc.
Something that REALLY helped me was just remember to keep your feet on
the pedals. No matter what. Riding backwards is a new feeling, so you
don't know what it feels like to do it right. You just step off because
you think you're falling.

--
James_Potter - Rettop_Semaj

-If there was an eleventh commandment, it is to be "thou shalt dip thy
pizza, for it is, wicked."-
--Thedan
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James_Potter said:

Something that REALLY helped me was just remember to keep your feet on
the pedals. No matter what. Riding backwards is a new feeling, so you
don't know what it feels like to do it right. You just step off because
you think you're falling.

I don't know about keeping your feet on the pedals. Several people
have reported injuries when learning to ride backwards, so my approach
has been to try to stay in control, stepping off if I start to pick up
spped, rather than push for distance. Even so, I rolled off the back
once and caught my elbow on the ground. Couldn't rest that elbow on a
table for a couple of months!

And that's learning to ride backwards after I could idle.

Ken

reject_monkey said:

i have tried about a thousand times to ride backwards, and as of yet
never managed atall. any tips or hints?

I learnt in a dance studio - which may not be much help unless you
happen to have access to a dance studio!

The big advantage was the wall length bar at just the right height for
gently hanging onto until I was ready to let go. I found hanging onto a
bar much more useful than hanging onto a wall, and easier to let go of.

--
Danny Colyer (the UK company has been laughed out of my reply address)
<URL:http://www.speedy5.freeserve.co.uk/danny/>
"He who dares not offend cannot be honest." - Thomas Paine

when i was learning (which was not that long ago) a huge trouble i had
was the transition from backwards to forwards (which made it impossible
for the "one revolution-stop, another revolution-stop" technique. so if
yer having this same trouble, i'd advise you to just practice the
transition by pushing off, pedaling one revolution max backwards, then
trying to go back to yer push off point. if yer noot using an object to
push off from, FIND ONE!! this may be a source of your frustration, as
its almost impossible to learn to ride backwards from a freemount (at
least until you can go 2 full revolutions from a push off point.

--
gasmaster - level 4 unicyclist

Real men only need 1 wheel.
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James_Potter said:

*
....Something that REALLY helped me was just remember to keep your
feet on the pedals. No matter what. Riding backwards is a new feeling,
so you don't know what it feels like to do it right. You just step off
because you think you're falling. *

good advice i found this to be the case also when learning

--
tom_edmonds - Finally...less talking, more riding

"rest and elevation" we know its all we'll be told, so why do we still
go and wait in A&E all day?
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Thanks! I've been having trouble with this too. I'm already better
thanks to this.

--
MuniTune - Bluto

R.
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