I found a trials competition!

[andrew_carter]

After many months of whining about the lack of trials riders and
competitions here in Brisbane, I finally found one! It's on the 17th of
January. The only problem is, I don't have anyone to ride with. I
don't suppose I could really enter it on my own and I wouldn't be too
keen on being the centre of attention that way anyway. You know, if all
you NZ people came over, we could get a whole unicycle category
together! :) Maybe I'll just go and watch and they might let me play
around on the course afterwards. I'm so miserable. How many people
does it usually take for the organisers to give you a category? Are
most of them friendly towards unicyclists?

Andrew


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[bugman]

On the upside, If you were the only rider, you would be a shoe in for a
first place finish!


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[ur]

I'm arriving in Brisbane on the 18th or 19th I think....


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[GizmoDuck]

andrew_carter wrote:
> *You know, if all you NZ people came over, we could get a whole
> unicycle category together! :) Maybe I'll just go and watch and they
> might let me play around on the course afterwards. I'm so miserable.
> How many people does it usually take for the organisers to give you a
> category? Are most of them friendly towards unicyclists?
>
> Andrew *


Trials is slightly out of my league and there aren't many trials
unicyclists in NZ. Tony Melton is one of the few and he competed in the
NZ bicycle trials nationals recently. I seem to recall that he came
first or second in his category despite competing against bi-cyclists.
I'm sure no matter how well you do you'll get some of the most cheers in
the competition :p

Have you set a date for the Aussie MUni weekend yet?


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[TonyMelton]

If you're keen enough to enter, just go and enter! Especially if you go
and plonk your entry fee down before you pull your uni out of the car!
I'd be surprized if you were refused entry, even if the organiser knew
you were on a unicycle. Most trials cyclists I've met are impressed that
I've even entered their comps. So if you want to, go for it!

The first trials comp I entered I got 8th out of 8 in the easiest
section. Earlier this year I entered two competitions and got 2nd in
both of the easy sections. There's a story about the 'NZ Indoor Trials
Comp' (http://tinyurl.com/2d89w).

I found that 24" MUni was much better for outdoor trials and for indoor
styles 20" was the go.


Tony
No 'natcher


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[andrew_carter]

No we haven't set a date yet....sorry. We're working on it but there's
a lot to sort out. It doesn't look like we'll be able to link it up
with an endurance MTB event.

You've convinced me to give it a shot I think. But I will ring up the
organisers first to make sure I'm welcome there. What can I expect (in
terms of skill) in the different difficulty levels?

BJ,
That's soooooo unfair! :( Well I'll show you around the Brisbane trails
and trials places anyway.

Thanks guys,
Andrew


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[TonyMelton]

If the race classes are at all similar to those in NZ biketrials comps,
I would enter the easiest class if you want to do the best you can. If
you want to be challenged, enter the intermediate section. Though what's
intermediate for bikes is sometimes really hard on a uni. Bear in mind
you only get one run to get over the obstacle, with up to 5 dabs. Unlike
in unicycle trials where you can try each section as many times as you
like until you get it. (You might get to do all the sections twice,
though).

Good luck!

See ya on Boxing Day!


--Tony


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[andrew_carter]

I did end up competing it the trials competition. Thanks for convincing
me to do so. I had a really really really really really good time and
everyone was so supportive and friendly. I entered the intermediate
category and I'm glad I did. My scores went 0, 5, 5, 0, 5, 0, 5. or
something like that in the first round, something similar in the second,
and in the final round I boosted one of those 5's to a 1 with a nice
strategic dab. The best news is that they're going to hold one of these
every month or two!!! The next is in about 6 weeks.

Some of the zones were actually very well suited to unicycles. The
first one I did was a rock section and I got 0's each time on it.

The second, see the attached picture, was my favourite. I made it up
the ladder on my first attempt which I was really happy about. The
rungs were spaced so that a wheel my size wouldn't make it up by hopping
in between them...I was forced to hop on top of them which I something I
haven't done much of at all so I was a bit worried about it. But i made
it, and once at the top I decided to take the fun way down. I wasn't
trying to win the competition or anything so I chose to go down the
tyres instead of just hopping straight down...maybe I should have just
hopped straight down. I did the gap to the first tyre okay, but as I
landed on the far side of it, my wheel slipped backwards and I did a big
face plant from the stack of two truck tyres to the single one. I tried
to land on my hands but they missed and went into the middle of the
single tyre leaving my face vulnerable. :) Luckily I ended up only
taking a tiny bit of skin off my nose and bruising it a bit and gettign
a blood nose. The good news is we got it on film for our movie!

The third zone was not at all unicycle friendly. I got 5's every time.
I managed a few times to do a sketchy crank grab / dab onto the first
big truck tyre and got around the first section of itbut then I was
faced with a high A-frame that I couldn't possibly hop onto nor
effectively dab onto.

The fourth zone should have been easy for me, having only one wheel, but
I screwed it up every time.

The fifth zone looked easy enough - all we had to do was get up and over
two truck tyres that were between 50 and 60cm high. I didn't have any
energy left to jump straight up so I tried to crank grab them and almost
did each time but the edges aren't square so it was harder to do. Plus
the whole course was on a bit of a slope.

The sixth zone was good fun and reasonably unicycle friendly. I got a 0
on my first attempt. We had to jump over a hole full of mud. The gap
wasn't very big but the problem was that the sidxes were also muddy.
Then furthur on I made my first successful crank grab onto a truck
tyre.

The last zone was really tricky for all of us. I'll attach another
picture after this post so I won't bother describing it too much. There
was lots of water. On one of my runs I landed in the creek which was
about 30cm deep but managed to hop out onto the bank. On the other side
there was a tricky hop onto a log. It was too high for me with the gap
I also had to do so I aimed for a little cut in it's side. I got there
but slipped out. On my final run through I managed a nice strategic dab
to get over the log. Remounting was a challenge but I took my time and
landed it. My best score on that one was a 1.

I had a really great time and I'm really looking forward to competing in
more of these events. One of the things I really liked was that it was
natural trials. Most of the surfaces were at odd angles which added a
tricky element to it. It's very good for trials practise.

Andrew


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[andrew_carter]

Here is a photo of the last zone. There's a lot of water that you can't
see in the picture on the near side of the log and it's all prtty deep.
:)


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[andrew_carter]

'The Faceplant!' (http://tinyurl.com/32wkv)


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