My first time

[Ed]

Took it out to a fairly inactive and vacant parking lot inside a recreational park, plenty of room and almost no people around.

The session lasted about 2 hours.  I practiced the push-off whole bunch of times (about 30 minutes).

Transitioned into learning to balance myself while moving forward for about an hour (alot of wobbling occurred, bunch of scrapes and glory scars on the EUC; I didn't fall down).

Last half hour, continued to practice moving forward + balance + trying wide turns.

Couple of young boys stopped to ask questions about it.

Wow! that was exciting! Like learning bicycle for first time but harder (cuz I'm older and out-of-shape).

Surprisingly I think I did pretty good, 9B1 app says I managed 5.5KM my first time.

[fearedbliss]

Congratulations :), keep it up!

[SlowMo]

You're a fast learner.Congrats! Just don't forget to wear some protection specially the wrist pads.

[Hunka Hunka Burning Love]

Congratulations on popping your cherry...er... learning how to ride!  Must be my dirty mind, but I had a whole different take on your description after reading your first few sentences...   Yes, definitely use protection. 

[Colestien]

Keep at it.  It will feel great at the end of each session and you can tell you have done better than the last session

[Villac]

Great work! Keep it up, stay safe. I've hit the wrist, knee, hip, my son has hit the knee, and tooth! I'm wearing helmet, wrist, knee, elbow, and glove guards. Consider putting up pictures, videos! Yesterday I had my first commute home in the rain, at night. I got stuck at work 6 hours longer than expected. The streets were barren and I loved it!

[Paulandjacquelyn]

Just started on my nb1+ about an hour ago and flying straight and in circles on my bumpy dirt yard.  Took about 8 tries to get feel of balance and then doing turns within 30 min. Not one crash or scratch....yet

So I'm 47 and about 35 years ago used to skate board, skate and even learned a uunicycle.   I am certain that balance memory kicks in.  My yard looks like the surface of mars and I'm having fun on all the bumps.

 

Love this thing! As I'm going I'm remembering all the tips from YouTube n here so super grateful!

[Colestien]

Good for you.  It's a great feeling when everything falls into place.  Enjoy the ride

[UKJ]

Hello.

I was going to start a new thread but it fits well here.

Just rode a NB1+ (big thanks to e-ride-shop.com) Christian ,for so kindly letting me learn with his euc.

As I mentioned in my profile I have ridden pedal unis for MANY years and am sportive to a certain level, kiteboarding,ect.

Have been reading tons here (HUGE thanks forum admins, informed posters) so had already trained in my head just before sleep as at least for me I learn well this way.

Well protected, quality wrist guards, elbow, knee, bike helmet, shin guards facing in, felt good.

Good advise from Christian, and must share something I have not read here yet, not to say it has not already been posted.

With a pole as support using left hand, and left foot on the ground, right on right uni foot plate, do arcs controlling the wheel front to back.

When I started to do this I immediately felt that learning to EUC would be VERY hard, it felt heavy and hard to balance with just one leg.

With a pole on one side and he on the other got both feet on and did SLOW, SHORT front to back movements, using ankle lever inputs and body leaning to "feel" what happens.

Then off I rode.

MUCH easier than I had imagined, but I was full on concentrating!

Keeping speed low did first turn, again not so hard.

I knew I would really like doing, learning this new skill, but it had already surpassed all expectations even after only a few minutes.

Now I knew that learning to speed up and slow down fully under control was needed, so tried to keep a straight line, looking at fixed object near horizon, and push down ball of foot to accelerate, and push down heel to brake.

Big understanding was had, foot placement was critical, even down to half a cm forward and back, AS WELL as side to side, and because I wore mountain bike shoes with serious tread and the 9B+ foot plates have great grip it felt hard to reposition my feet on the fly. I found riding up to a pole for support and getting my feet well placed made all the difference!

Again thanks to a tip from C, I would mount alone but using pole, get correct foot placement, and go slow forward and back to feel the EUCs reaction.

As there were well aligned marks on the pavement and at various spacing I started to do slalom weaving, so FUN! Timing the combination of body yaw input with foot pressure

was tested, getting better with each run.

Noticed that I seemed to brake when turning so had to concentrate on more front foot pressure to keep speed up, and left turns better than right.

Felt that there is a relationship between fore, aft foot plate pressure and body forward, back lean, so played with this for a few runs.

I would take brakes but felt so bad because when I would stop using pole as support the poor EUC would fall over, bang, not so good for shell casing health.

I would watch C ride, he has about 1,500 k since April and goes fast, well controlled reverse,  clean tight on spot pivot 180s, forward into 180 exit reverse, one foot circles, two foot hop on starts, ECT... nice to see!

He is skilled and a confirmed addict as I will be, maybe am already?

We hope to do video and may share if good enough?

My feet got tight while up and learning, but that was the only body problem I felt.

Now off to do forward circles around an object trying to keep same radius about 4 m to train.

C suggested approaching a pole at walking speed and using hand on it do a 360 circle around it, arms length radius, I was unable to do one of these to my satisfaction as can do so well on normal uni!

Really tried to stop using pole and not let EUC fall, was not very good.

Time to see if I can do an unassisted push off start?

Did not use enough front foot pressure to get EUC up to speed and it (not me) fell, again ouch for the poor 9B+, I now know EUCs for beginners need generous shell casing padding to protect it from damage! I suck at keeping the EUC balanced upright against my leg and feel so inapt and clumsy! Starting and stopping!

After a few more attempts finally got the timing and pressure OK but had the same problem of not perfect foot plate placement, pole stop, reposition, more fun muscle memory training!

I will say I was astounded at the machines reactivity, it sure felt like it did what inputs I gave it, meaning all errors were me!

Probable what helped most was C being there for teaching as for sure would have not progressed like that without him and a you tube vid https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p60rFWypkMs

Thanks Jason!

As I felt just a little more at easy decided to go as slow as possible, I think Iearned a lot from this and this and when I felt and knew that all my many, many hours on a peddle uni were coming into play. I felt comfortable on one wheel only because I knew somewhat to expect.

I did fall doing a tight turn directly on an unseen stainless steel street pole cover, wheel slipped out, so great to have top quality wrist guards but learned that side hip protection would have come in handy, will search for something, maybe motorcycle or ice hockey pants, shorts. I am slightly sore from this but in a way glad I crashed on first session as now know it can and probably will happen. Because of this I sure felt better having my arms comfortably outstretched both for side to side balance and crash protection.

Seems stupid to ever ride with hands in pockets!

Again, Thank you to those knowledgeable experienced posters here for their time and in site, I will continue to read all I can here!

I have SO much to learn, I sure wish there was a clear frontrunner EUC for quality and safety so I could have my own and stop hurting Cs. Leaning towards  KS14c 800w, 540 battery.

Oh well time to read more here!

Question?

As much as I used to enjoy off road P(edal)uc, but freestyle as well, I wonder your thoughts between 14" and 16"?

Sorry if this post reads so much "I", just wanted to share my joy and maybe someone might gleam some something?

UKJ