Seated Riding By the Ignoramus

[techyiam]

10 minutes ago, gon2fast said:

Got bounced off my S22 while riding seated earlier this week. I was cruising down a paved walking path around 10mph with a bag of groceries in one hand and came upon a section of the path that was damaged by the tree roots. Seemed manageable until I got within a few feet of the ruts LOL. The ruts were far larger than I thought so I tried to stand up as I was hitting the first one. Not sure what happened when I was raising up, but I ended up on my feet on the pavement. I paused for a second to try and figure out what had happened (and why I was not laid out on the path). Came to after a few seconds and realized that my S22 was still rolling down the path without me LOL. I went into a full speed sprint and was able to catch the wheel by the seat before it hit the ground. Pretty sure I looked like a bumbling idiot through it all, but I will happily take an embarrassing situation that results with no injuries or damage to the wheel anyday.

 

Good recovery. Not always easy with a bag of groceries. 

[gon2fast]

3 hours ago, techyiam said:

Not always easy with a bag of groceries. 

The outcome was pure luck. On any other day I would have hit the ground LOL... like when I fell off the back of the wheel trying to stand up a few months ago.

[Planemo]

7 hours ago, gon2fast said:

Not sure what happened when I was raising up

You haven't put bigger pads on recently have you?! I had a similar one on my Sherman, but going from standing to seated. I had swopped from the stock pads to slightly larger ones (Shanes Planet ones - funny guy, sadly no longer here) and had totally forgot about them when I went to sit down - the back of my calf caught on the front of the pad with obvious consequences and only by the grace of the EUC Gods did I not go flying forwards. It was a huge save, hanging over the front of the wheel on tipping point, massive wobbles for about 20 meters, no skill involved whatsoever just pure luck. It's the closest I have ever come to a proper (non walking speed) crash. I pooped my pants for sure.

[Weatherman159]

TLDR: Attempting seated riding has caused my first 'real' EUC injury. Help me analyze the cause so I can try again in the future.

Long version:

Since getting my Sherman S, I've been thinking about seated riding again. There's this one stretch of deserted road on my way to work, and in the past weeks I've been training every day when I ride it - basically just doing squats and trying to keep balance.

Last Friday, on my morning commute, I managed to go lower than ever and my butt connected with the thin bit of foam that is the Sherman S stock seat. So, happily, I though: "I've got it", and planted my weight on the seat. What followed was an almost immediate loss of stability, the wheel veered left and tilted and I instinctively threw out my right leg to try and stop it from falling over - which is what got me. The full weight of me, gear, backpack and Sherman was thrown into my knee, which couldn't take it, buckled and down I went. 

After I managed to breathe through the worst of the pain, I figured out pretty quickly that I couldn't walk on the leg, but also that, with considerable pain, I could ride, so I rode the rest of the way to work and from there took a cab to the hospital.

Now I'm off the wheel for who knows how long, I can't walk and I'm trying to put together what I did wrong so I can bounce back from this with some sort of plan. The only things that come to mind are that I was probably going too slow (about 10 mph according to EUC world logs) and I probably shouldn't have put all my weight on the seat, but if anyone has any other ideas, please do let me know.

[The Brahan Seer]

1 hour ago, Weatherman159 said:

but if anyone has any other ideas, please do let me know.

Is this the first time you have tried riding seated? if so then the issue is that it uses different muscle groups, core more than legs to balance so you need to learn how to ride in this different way. I started by getting my balance on the wheel seated and holding onto a rail or something to support myself and slowly pushing off from there and learned to balance that way. Bare in mind this was on the S18 with no seat. For me it was too low to sit on from a standing position. Although I could go from sitting to standing-go figure. So pretty much like learning to ride again from scratch.

*To any S18 owners reading this, it was brought to my attention that riding seated on the S18 is not a good idea because your weight pushes down on the motherboard via the plastic housing so its not recommended.

Edited August 25, 2023 by The Brahan Seer
Clarification

[Planemo]

First off...sorry to hear about your crash.....always start any seated practice on grass!

I learnt seated by transitioning from standing to seated rather than starting seated from zero speed. I also did the same as you - just practised getting my butt lower and lower until until I felt it touch the wheel (this was on an MSX with factory seat). I kept doing that until I could just touch the seat without wobbling too much, and then standing back up. When I felt comfortable doing that the next time I just dropped (quickly) on top and just tried to stay upright. I was probably doing this about 10mph. Many times (like learning to ride standing) I would veer off to one side but after about a day of practising the veers became less and I was just left with some wobbling. The next day it was OK and the wobbling became less and less, just like learning to ride standing.

The trick is transitioning quickly (for most people) because when you ride seated only the tips of your toes are on the pedals so at some point during the transition all your weight is going on the front of the pedals with obvious results. I suspect that in your situation you had a little bit too much on the front left whilst going down and this caused you to veer left and then you instinctively put out your right leg but by this time all would be lost - I don't think you would have enough height in your body when seated to counteract the weight of an outstretched leg (I certainly wouldn't want to try it!)

In short I don't think you really did anything 'wrong' it's just part of the learning in transitioning. It's the same when getting back up - it has to be done quickly and of course the wheel will want to shoot forward quickly (how quickly depends on the wheel - a Sherman would be slower than say a KS 16X) but the whole movement is counteracted by your body position.

I've waffled a bit there and not sure if it provides any help but rest assured that it's not easy, just as riding an EUC standing isn't easy. And some people learn seated by starting seated so theres no hard rule. But as I say, get it nailed on soft ground and you shouldn't need more than say 10mph.