Video: Extreme Mountain Unicycling
Oct 10, 2012 at 0:01
Oct 10, 2012
Stephanie Dietze and Lutz Eichholz unicycling down a 3011m high mountain in the Dolomites. Every meter off the descent challenged the athletes to their limits and mistakes where often not allowed. Thanks to adidas outdoor and planet-talk for helping to make this project possible.
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165 Comments
sick vid tho... guess Adolf did not know...
Supposedly owns Carbon Wilson with Fox 40's and RC4 Full Saint Build and Chromag components
*no photos/videos of riding or bikes.
Calls Uni-cycles and hard tails gay.
Yeah, you scream "beginner mountain biker."
Might want to open a history book... O wait... everything in this world is taught "evil germans". LMAO. Silly uneducated sheep. The majority of Germans during WW2 hated Hitler and hated everything about the Nazi party. Just because someone was German in WW2 didn't mean they were a Nazi, and just because someone then, and even today is a "Nationalist" doesn't mean they are Nazi's either. But then again, I guess being 21 and in Poland you really know your stuff. Poland had so much hated for the Nazi's after rolling over them, that even in modern day they are brainwashed into saying "bad BAD germans". Lmao.
The Nazi's bombed the living frack out of my family in Britain, but I don't go around saying it's the germans... they were all evil in those days. LMAO.
ww2 germans = the Wehrmacht (army) / luftwaffe (airforce) etc etc
very few were actually nazis, and few nazis actually fought. Those guys were SS.
The more you know
Now to the Polish taking any offence: Urodzilem sie w Polsce i bylem w Oswiecimiu kilkanascie razy. Nie jest to smieszne miejsce ale pelne zadumy i sam nierzadko sie tam poplakalem. Moj komentarz byl zartem- nie trzeba lubic zartow innych ludzi. Jesli cie urazilem moim zartem- przepraszam.
Now back to the main subject... Research before spreading? That is the end of it from me- thank you very much and goodnight!
for the people getting worried about my balls. its nice to hear that my private parts gain that much attention.
i am also a mountainbiker and so fare i didnt see a difference in comfort on bike seats compared to unicycle seats (probably because i unicycle mostly on terrain where i cant sit on my saddle).
Later, reach the top, as we get there, we see the unicyclist again. Now, he's hauling ass down a super steep part that normally a regular bike would have to slam the brakes on...we're are just blown out of our minds.
Now, we figured a normal bike should be able to descend much faster than a unicycle. Wrong. When we finally got back down to the base we packed up and started driving. We were a mile down the road back to home, when we see the unicyclist again. Seriously, at this point I was just like "Wtf."
This guy, beat us at climbing, hauled ass down even faster, and was already a mile ahead of us as we got home. Ever since then, I have the most respect for unicyclists....
I was a dedicated mountain unicyclist for three years while living in Phoenix. I have not reached that level of fitness again since switching to DH / freeride and more recently road (oh the horor!). I think the big differece is never being able to coast or rest ever while on the uni!
29ers, 26″ wheels, 650B, 24″ wheels, singlespeeds, geared bikes, 1×9, 2×9, 3×10, unicycles....one wheel is just an option in a long list of choices in cycling - of which almost all are outside the mainstream - and our reasons for riding are not always that different....In a way, our reaction to seeing a single wheel on a trail or video is a kind of reminder as to whether we remember this.
Sure, no one just climbs on a unicycle for the first time and rides away unassisted (except for that guy from Buthan in the Thunder Dragon video). Same goes for riding a bicycle or even for walking. But this never kept anyone from learning to ride a bike or learning how to walk, right? Still, you'll learn quickly. A week or two, half an hour practice a day and you're riding unassisted. Then maybe a few more years of practice, a lot of talent, determination and a some more and you'll be on the level shown in this video. Fall short of this goal and you'll still be having a bloody good time.
Kris, thanks for helping to bring this sport and gear to the level it is today. And thanks for your enthusiasm, you're an inspiration.
Bonus: it's a much cheaper hobby than DH biking since there's nothing to break.
I watched some kids unicycle down one of the DH courses we were racing on. It was quite amazing they killed it!
The kudos about difficulty are appreciated but its a stereotype that can also push riders away from a sport far more accessible than many mountain bikers think. It's not a theoretical argument: across all divisions the most recent World Unicycling Championships in Italy had about 2000 registered riders. Riding a bike is tough too - the only difference between muni and mountain biking is that most mountain bikers don't start riding from the perspective of not being able to even ride down the street.
No?
A male prostitute who has been riding cocks for 10+ years will be very talented at riding dicks, but he is still gay.
A unicyclist who has been riding unicycles for 10+ years will be very talented at riding unicycles, but he is still gay.
..sorry i had to. still a cool sport.
I stand by my words, riding a scooter take zero talent. Think about it. Riding a bicycle take a little talent, because you need to learn a bit of balance just to get on the thing and ride around the parking lot. Riding a skateboard, again, takes a bit of talent, because there's quite a bit of balance involved. Certainly, your average Joe could not ride skateboard. But anyone, ANYONE, can get on a scooter and go, no problem, no balance, skill, or talent required. Backflips requiring talent? Not really. More so, they require a comittment to overcome fear. Although they look spectular (because they look death-defying) backflips actually aren't that difficult. Ever do a backflip on a trampoline? Okay, granted, a backflip on a scooter in a skatepark would be slight more difficult than doing a backflip on a trampoline, but the talent required is nothing in comparisson to accomplishing similar tricks on a bike or skateboard, because scooters are so naturally easy to ride.
And in regards to respect, I pay respect where respect is earned and deserved. With unicycling, although the sport does not appeal to me in the slightest, I respect that it must to incredibly difficult to master, particularly so in a downhill environment, and I therefore respect anyone who was able to master the sport. But scooters? Come on! They're a toy for kids either too scared or talentless to ride a skateboard, or whose parents can't afford to buy them a bike. All the time I'm watching kids in the skatepark, on there lame little scooters, thinking, "Now there goes a real badass". End of story.
Of course simply using the scooter as transportation takes zero talent yeah but using the scooter as a means of skill development is where practice and effort are involved.
Would you say it takes zero talent to do road biking and xc biking because everyone can 'ride a bike'?
Every sport requires dedication and talent 'If you want to be at the top in that sport'.
And so what, the unicycle deserves respect just because its hard?
Deep throating a cock takes talent, taking a cock in the ass takes talent too
Every sport will require dedication and talent to be at the top level
However whether a sport is cool or 'gay' simply depend on its image
While I will consent that some degree of respect is earned by anyone who puts in the effort to become the best in their sport, the degree of respect earned will necessarily vary with the degree of difficulty of the sport, and the degree of competitiveness in the sport.
So, following your analogies, road racers earn respect not because riding a bike is difficult on its own, but because competiting in the Tour du France is extemely difficult (ie. distances, elevation gains, etc.), and also because the caliber of the competitors is all extremely high.
But I think it's just silly to attempt to compare the effort needed to learn to ride a scooter with that needed to ride a unicycle. There is no comparison. That's why there are so many kids at the skatepark on scooters, but no kids riding around on unicycles. It's not because one is "cool" and the other "lame" (which are just arbitrary, relativistic terms used to describe somethings popularity with the herd-mentality crowd), it's because one is extremely easy to get into, and the other extremely difficult.
Whether an activity is cool or gay simply depend on its image.
Unicycles are gay not because I don't do it, but because you constantly hit your balls then you have to grab the handle right in front of your balls to use brake, all while sitting at 90 degrees with fixed drive train so no flow
cool sports involve speed and big air. (I don't decide on this, general public does)
I do bike trials and I will admit that certain parts CAN be gay such as skin suits people wear during comps and excessive hopping. So I try to make trials aesthetically pleasing to public by reducing hops and adding more flow.
It's all about image in the sport and unicycles are simply gay. End of story
There is a reason Red bull sponsors downhill and trials riding but not this unicycle shit.
Let me know if you do not understand this
And you say society decides it's gay...wut.
And this has more speed and flow then trials riding...
congrats Lutz and Steffi for their adventure and the video, it's very cool!
Many of these sections are (nearly) impossible for mountainbikes. Bikes are too long and the handlebars are too wide to ride that close to a wall.
At least that's my preception of it. Maybe that's also why I'm fast but crash a lot though...
Cparks, you've got such a funny statement, it just ended up in the wrong place. Try posting it in a topic where you see someone smoke a sigaret, where you see dirtjumpers in tight jeans, where you see a road cyclist ride with a high narrow saddle ride for several hours, several days in a row. Tell it to everyone who switches on the heated seats in a deluxe car. These are all things known to possibly cause malfunction down there. This is definitely not the case with mountain unicycling. You can duck on unicycle when you land. Unlike a bicycle with the seat up high, the unicycle simply tilts back. Also, you're pretty upright when you're riding unlike a mountainbike where you've already got your upper body bent forwards. So on a unicycle you can really lower your center of mass a lot if you're absorbing a hit. Finally, there is no upper tube or stem on a unicycle to crash into. If you crash, most of the cases you're completely free from your unicycle, you won't come entangled like you could on a bicycle.
Look at it like this. What if not the bicycle was the norm, but the unicycle was. What if someone shows up with a XC bike with these narrow tyres (a MUni typically comes with a 3" tyre), a narrow hard saddle and a construction that doesn't really tilt or give much upon impact. People would be making comments like yours. Of course we know it is fine as it is. You can have loads of fun on a mountainbike, even more so if you just lower the saddle. And it is not what keeps people from getting kids when they want to. And if mountainbiking doesn't, then mountain unicycling for sure doesn't either.
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