Foot Position

Unicorn said:

I see my leg/foot as a lever. The shorter the lever the more power it is
going to have. You will be able to lift much more weight with your knee
than with your foot.

Unicorn

You don't get more leverage from a shorter lever, you get more leverage
from a longer lever. Sprinters use the balls of their feet, road
cyclists use the balls of their feet, horses run on their toenails.
Longer lever=more power. Simple physics. In martial arts, to achieve
the greatest impact from a kick, you use the ball of your foot to
impact your target, not your arch or your heel.

--
Beetle
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johnfoss said:

Wow, you must be an expert! Say, have you had any traumatic brain
injuries? If you don't wear a helmet and you haven't, I guess that
means we don't need to either! 🙄

Good grief, I was just saying my experience. And seeing as I'm not
falling on my head on the time, but I am using the balls of my toes all
the time...there's a significant difference. I'm not trying to wind
people up.

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I always ride with the pedal towards the front of my arch but when I go
to flip I move my foot back so the pedal is on the ball of my foot as
this helps to flip the cranks faster.

--
sp4rky-m4rky

you may be lucky but you make your own luck

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Beetle

Longer lever more speed shorter lever more power. Think of it this
way:

If you stick your arm out and hang weights from it you would be able to
hang much more weight from your elbow than from your hand or the tip of
your finger before your arm collapses. However if you swing your arm in
an arc then the tip of your finger is moving much farther and faster
than your elbow moves.

Yes, if you are trying to move a rock then you want the handle of the
lever (Part of the lever between the pivot point and your hands.) to be
longer. You also want that rock that you are trying to move to be as
close to the pivot as possible. That means shorter. With a human leg
unicycling the pivot point would be the hip therefore the closer the
resistance to the hip the more power you will be able to exert.
Bicycalist with their gears usually don't have a power problem they
need speed therefore they would use the balls of thier feet because
they are farther away from the point of pivot.

Unicorn

--
Unicorn

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Unicorn said:

Beetle

Longer lever more speed shorter lever more power. Think of it this
way:

If you stick your arm out and hang weights from it you would be able to
hang much more weight from your elbow than from your hand or the tip of
your finger before your arm collapses. However if you swing your arm in
an arc then the tip of your finger is moving much farther and faster
than your elbow moves.

Yes, if you are trying to move a rock then you want the handle of the
lever (Part of the lever between the pivot point and your hands.) to be
longer. You also want that rock that you are trying to move to be as
close to the pivot as possible. That means shorter. With a human leg
unicycling the pivot point would be the hip therefore the closer the
resistance to the hip the more power you will be able to exert.
Bicycalist with their gears usually don't have a power problem they
need speed therefore they would use the balls of thier feet because
they are farther away from the point of pivot.

Unicorn

I guess what we are actually talking about here is torque, not
leverage. Your example of the weight hanging from the fingers vs. the
elbow is correct but not because of leverage. The principle is torque
at the pivot point (the sholder). A lever uses a fulcrum to create
mechanical advantage (the stick moving the rock). I still think you
can create more force at at the ball of your foot (cyclists *do* want
to use the most efficient use of their energy regardless of the use of
gears, they are racing to win). Try to jump into the air from your
heels, then try to jump into the air using the balls of your foot. You
can jump significantly higher using the foot as an additional lever.
If we are talking about preventing injury to the ankle, then you should
use the arch of your foot (because the torque is reduced at the pivot
point from having a shorter lever, force is applied upward from the
petal to the foot and creates torque at the ankle).
If this theory holds true, then the placement of the foot should depend
on what you are doing. If you want to ride for distance or speed, then
use the balls of the feet. If you are doing drops, jumps, and other
stunts where the risk of ankle injury is greater, then use the arches
of your feet.

Does this make sense?

Beetle

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yatsey said:

Good grief, I was just saying my experience. And seeing as I'm not
falling on my head on the time, but I am using the balls of my toes all
the time...there's a significant difference. I'm not trying to wind
people up.

no you were argueing your experience, theirs a significant difference,
and considering almost everyone (unless someone cares to contradict me
with evidence) uses their arches over their balls, probably means you
are wrong about balls being better.
john right though
when someone tells you you are wrong, whatever
when everyone tells you you are wrong, then most likely you are wrong

--
torkerdx

gordito8me said:

it's like running across the highway at rush hour. Dangerous, stupid,
but not really that fun.

Unicaw89 said:

Koxx rapes Torker hard!

skianduniaddict said:

never give 4 teenagers a camera... they go crazy

johnfoss said:

Yes, being old makes you stupid.

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Then things get complicated....

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Well, I use my arches for everything, ive done 3ft drops on the balls of
my feet, that hurt my ankles for a week or two. Hurt a lot. Also, if
your riding arches it doesnt matter as long as your using good shoes. I
use some converse like skate shoes. Good thick souls. Dont use
hightops, you can ever feel the spikes in your pedal from that

--
unibikeling

Everyone hates clowns

Ive gone about the whole summer without unicycling, I procrastenated on
sending some cranks back

When I bent my first set of crankarms, I thought it was bad thing; when
i jumped off of a picnic table, well, my photo says it. thats about a
20-30 degree bend.
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torkerdx said:

balls are better for you (i think)
if you do drops, ride arches, because other wise you WILL roll your
ankles (over flex them on the landing)

i have rolled my ankle 3 or 4 times how do i prevent it from happining
again?

--
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Mountain Uni.
Do the MUni!

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bob1993 said:

i have rolled my ankle 3 or 4 times how do i prevent it from happining
again?

move to your arches if you arent already their.
if you are and are repeatedly doing it, then take a break (couple of
days) so your ankle has a chance to heal itself before doing more
dropd. also focus on keeping you ankles from bending

most people will roll their ankles every now and then anyways no matter
how good they are

--
torkerdx

gordito8me said:

it's like running across the highway at rush hour. Dangerous, stupid,
but not really that fun.

Unicaw89 said:

Koxx rapes Torker hard!

skianduniaddict said:

never give 4 teenagers a camera... they go crazy

johnfoss said:

Yes, being old makes you stupid.

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As a lifelong biker, it always feels odd for me to have anything but the
balls of my feet on the pedal axle. But when I muni, I mostly follow
Kevin's advice, and move my foot around as conditions warrant. However,
I would say that most of the time, my foot when muniing is slightly
more toward the arches than toward the balls. This is due to
experience--even on smaller drops (I don't do many big drops) I've
tweaked my ankles when my feet are on the balls.

I must say I'm impressed by the fact that this thread has been, so far,
free of double entendres. It's been a bit of a wrench for me not to
make some sort of off-color remark!

--
pkittle

*==========================
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"The Revolution is just a t-shirt away."
--Billy Bragg
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maestro8 said:

Sounds like the writings of someone who's never injured their ankle on a
drop.

Think of the foot as a lever, and the ankle as the fulcrum. For a
constant force on the foot, the longer the lever, the more torque is
applied to the ankle.

Stay off them toes when you drop, kiddies! Sprained ankles take a
while to heal!

This.

--
ChangingLINKS.com

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torkerdx said:

move to your arches if you arent already their.
if you are and are repeatedly doing it, then take a break (couple of
days) so your ankle has a chance to heal itself before doing more
dropd. also focus on keeping you ankles from bending

most people will roll their ankles every now and then anyways no matter
how good they are

Thanks ill try that

--
bob1993

Mountain Uni.
Do the MUni!

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sp4rky-m4rky said:

I always ride with the pedal towards the front of my arch but when I go
to flip I move my foot back so the pedal is on the ball of my foot as
this helps to flip the cranks faster.

Dude the ball is at the front of your foot. Right? I am like 99.9
percent sure.

--
wickedbob

R.I.P JOHNNY HART[/B]
[B]R.I.P MITCH HEDBERG

Ducttape said:

not gonna show you it tonight becasue I am going to play with it until I
go to bed to get it just right.........

bob1993 said:

Thanks ill try that

Also do abc's. Lay down, or sit down (laying down is comfortable, and
probably better) and extend your leg out, and keep your ankle up, not
loose and hanging there. Then, just use you toes to fully draw out the
letters of the alphabet. For most people, this gets your ankles/foot
burning by the time they get to Z.

Its a good exercise, and keeps your ankle nice and strong, but still
limber.

wickedbob said:

Dude the ball is at the front of your foot. Right? I am like 99.9
percent sure.

Yep, the ball is at the front, and im sure he knows that too, but just
worded his sentence. I too move to the balls of my feet before I do a
crankflip, but I land on my arches.

--
Jerrick

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wickedbob said:

Dude the ball is at the front of your foot. Right? I am like 99.9
percent sure.

yea it is I think

For flips I move my foot back so that the pedal is further forward in
comparison to my foot because it makes it easer to flip the cranks
faster.

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Hi Beetle,

What you write makes sense. You grasp the matter. The amount of torque
generated depends on the length of the lever.

Unicorn

--
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About the physics:

with feets at 90° from the legs, the distance knee-ball is a bit more
than the one knee-arch (that's a bit more than knee-toe, of course).

But the lever exerting the power is the thigh (hip-knee). What's below
is just transmission. If you had 1m shins, but the same thighs, a
higher seat etc. would have other problems, but would need to apply the
same force on the same slopes.

Obviously, the ankle is not rigid: the pros are more muscles involved
possibly adding power (as in bicycle), and fine control. An extensible
transmission, so to speak. The cons are a certain frailty of this
juncture, so that it could be useful to take back the feet to the
arches to avoid injuries.

Personally, I'm not going into any kind of drops (above some inches,
doing mild muni). But I feel more comfortable with arches when doing
steep uphill on trails: with a strong hold on the handle and arches on
pedals I feel more "one with the uni", I sense more traction and get on
better. Maybe it's lack of technique or strenght in the lower muscles
that lead to this.

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yatsey said:

But sureley if you put your arches on a big drop, that will impact much
more on your arches than it would on your toes. Think about it, you're
not compacting the toe joints like you would your ankles. You can use
your toe joints as a way of increasing the impulse across your ankle
and therefore reducing the impact of the force on the ankle.

Know your own strength. Get calves of steel.

Also when you're ready or prepared for the jump,drop etc; do the toes
if you like toes.. But if your not ready or it doesn't go as planned,
the arches are probably safer.

--
critter

MUni all the time Brah! I'm looking for win-win situations.
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