I have not ridden a bike since I was about six or so. I had a pink bike with white tires and white grips and pedals and a Snoopy basket on the front. I took a pretty bad spill at which point I remember my parents informing me that I was officially too big for my bike. I could ride my older brother's bike.
But it was a boy's bike and it had spiky pedals on it and I chose not to. And then I eventually forgot how to ride a bike. Having grown quite a bit since then and having recently acquired a bike of my own, I figured it was time to try again. So, the adage is that you never forget, right? Time to put that to the test!
But it was a boy's bike and it had spiky pedals on it and I chose not to. And then I eventually forgot how to ride a bike. Having grown quite a bit since then and having recently acquired a bike of my own, I figured it was time to try again. So, the adage is that you never forget, right? Time to put that to the test!
Bertha is a different beast. She's a Schwinn out of the 70s, we gather. And to be perfectly honest, I expected to take right to it away. It's not that I wanted to put "it's like riding a bike" down as a proven thing, but I have decent balance in a few contexts and, well, I wanted it to come pretty naturally.
I have no idea what I'm doing. I get the general idea of not leaning too far forward or too far to one side or the other, but putting it in practice has been kind of tricky.
I'm thirty-one years old and I'm learning to ride a bike basically from scratch. My pink bike with the Snoopy basket (it was Joe Cool with a giant strawberry, if we're going to be specific) did not have any gears, and I pedaled backwards in order to brake. Whelp, apparently I do remember the pedal backwards part somewhere in the back of my mind because I definitely forget to squeeze the handbrakes and get confused when pedaling backward doesn't slow me down. And as for the gears, I know how to drive a manual transmission car (I've actually driven manual longer than Andy has) so I get the concept of what's happening between torque and such, but I don't know how to "feel" when it's right to shift gears on the bike yet, let alone feel comfortable enough to reach to the middle where the shifter is.
But on the plus side, my bail reflex is pretty solid. I can jump off like a champ when I think I'm about to hit one of the parked cars in the lot. Andy says he jogged more in that first adventure, chasing me for support, than he probably did in the last year.
I'm thirty-one years old and I'm learning to ride a bike basically from scratch. My pink bike with the Snoopy basket (it was Joe Cool with a giant strawberry, if we're going to be specific) did not have any gears, and I pedaled backwards in order to brake. Whelp, apparently I do remember the pedal backwards part somewhere in the back of my mind because I definitely forget to squeeze the handbrakes and get confused when pedaling backward doesn't slow me down. And as for the gears, I know how to drive a manual transmission car (I've actually driven manual longer than Andy has) so I get the concept of what's happening between torque and such, but I don't know how to "feel" when it's right to shift gears on the bike yet, let alone feel comfortable enough to reach to the middle where the shifter is.
But on the plus side, my bail reflex is pretty solid. I can jump off like a champ when I think I'm about to hit one of the parked cars in the lot. Andy says he jogged more in that first adventure, chasing me for support, than he probably did in the last year.
By the end, I was launching much more cleanly. I could go straight with some confidence, pick up speed, and glide. But turning, well, that I don't think I quite get, yet. My weight has to shift differently, and I definitely haven't figured out where to lean. Not ready for the road yet, certainly, but off to a good start, at least.
Survey says: I'm learning all over again. I get the concepts intellectually, but it's going to take some practice. And I'm willing to take the practice in small lumps. Andy says that I did far better than he expected, but there's a small part of my pride that twinges a bit when I just jumped off instead of completing a turn correctly and I see a little seven-year-old neighbor whizz by us on their bike. I'm also not keen on flipping over the handlebars or running into parked cars if I can avoid it maybe a little more so than when I was six--to be honest, my special awareness is either totally there or totally not, and I'm very aware of that at this point in my life.
There are a lot of little things that need to be remembered all at once: don't lean this way, sit up straight, keep your feet moving, be aware of where traffic is coming from, relax, don't run over Andy, watch out for the ruts in the driveway, brake by using the brakes and not pedaling backwards, figure out how and when the shifter works, don't eat concrete, make sure your helmet is on correctly, amongst others. I'm having a terrible time trying to balance all of that while literally balancing myself.
A friend pointed out a comparison recently--I had bombarded him with different ways to improve his swimming stroke, things that I knew how to balance instinctively on a few levels, elements that I had committed to muscle memory without having to think much about them. The last mile I swam, I was definitely thinking more about these things, why I was positioned the way I was, why I twisted the way I did during the pull phase and how I got into position for the glide phase, etc. I simply need to grow these pieces for bike riding, build that muscle memory.
So to that adage, "it's like riding a bicycle: you never really forget," I say that there might be a statute of limitations on there. Either that or I was always terrible at riding a bike. Also possible. More data is needed.
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