How to Ride a Unicycle Forward

Video Transcript

"So in this clip, we're going to talk about riding forward, how to start out, kind to the principles of how to stay on the unicycle and not fall off. Basically what you want to remember with the unicycling is you just want to keep the wheel underneath you. If you start to fall back like this while you're riding along, you want to slow down. Your momentum will bring you back up straight. If you start to fall forward kind of, you want to pedal a little bit faster and bring the wheel back under you, and that will keep you up. A lot of times when you start out, people will fall forward. So, they're going like this and instead of pedaling faster, they just step off the unicycle. Usually what it takes is once you get a little more used to it, you just do a couple quick pedals, it brings it right back underneath you and you keep going. So, I'm going to start out on this pole again, holding onto something. I'm going to rock up, onto the unicycle. Kind of idle a couple times, get used to, get used to the feeling. Now a big mistake, I'd say the biggest mistake people make when they do this is they're afraid to commit staying on top of the unicycle and going out. They're afraid they're going to fall on their face. Really there's not a lot of danger. I've never seen anybody fall on their face, you always land on your feet, you just step off the unicycle. It's really not that risky. But what people's reaction is to that fear is they stick their butt out like this because they don't want to be too far forward. And they start riding like this. And not only does that look terrible but it's not a good way to ride a unicycle. You want the post of the unicycle to pretty much be straight up. Better to lean more forward than backward. So, the key to starting out unicycling, the first time you're going to ride, is to just keep pedaling. So, we're just going to go forward. Keep your arms out for stabilization and just keep pedaling. Keep pedaling forward. Now, it's probably going to take two or three days of trying that over and over again to finally get to the place where you can actually do that. You're going to enter the crazy stage, which is you start out going like this, all over the place, and looking like you're going to kill yourself. But if you just keep doing it, I'd say about two or three days, you're going to get that forward, smooth forward ride going on. As far as going side to side, arms, use your arms. If you're leaning to this side, put your arms over this way and that will start to bring you back up. And once you get, once you get the feeling for it, it becomes like second nature and you'll throw your hips in there and you'll figure it out, how to, how to stay up. So, we'll do it one more time. And I like to keep my arms out just like this when I start out. You just keep pedaling. Keep leaning forward and pedaling."