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3 Oceans Unicycle Tour

Yes, that crazy man who unicycled across India is at it again.  Sid Rajan is riding across Australia as part of his honours thesis.  Having just recently ridden across Tasmania as part of the Tasmania Unicycle Tour, Sid will be taking on the rest of Australia in a test of endurance.

“The aim of this research project is to arrive at a deeper understanding of the embodied experience of long distance cycle touring in relation to the space-time dimension of the experience.”

Sounds like an incredibly painful experiment to me! The tour will take place in June-July 2009.  Folllow his journey here: 3 Oceans Unicycle Tour Website

Sid in Laos

Good luck Sid!

Tasmania Unicycle Tour 14-18 April

The Tasmania Unicycle Tour is underway with 7 unicyclists led by 14yr old Aubin Gill taking part.

Follow their epic 330km journey around Tasmania, from Launcheston to Hobart!

http://aegis666.com/tasuni2009/

http://tinyurl.com/tasuni

Update from Induni

The tour is well and truly in the Himalayas, with big mountains, long descents, and kids chasing and waving to us wherever we go.  We’ve gone from the steamy lowlands to the tea plantations and leg numbing climbs as we ascended to over 2000m elevation. Today is a rest day in Kalimpong before heading into Sikkim state tomorrow.

Here a a few photos from the trip so far:

induni1

Geoff being chased by kids

induni4

Sweeping switchbacks

Jason entertains the kids

Jason entertains the kids

A local gets a helping hand

A local gets a helping hand

New articles online

We’ve added a couple of articles on Adventure Unicyclist.  Both are related to concepts which are slowly creeping into unicycling.

The first article is about setting up unicycles more like bicycles…particularly for road riding.  The reasoning is that as unicyclists start riding faster and over longer distances, the most comfortable set-up is one refined over a century by our two wheeled cousins.  There is already vigorous debate on the forums and many new designs coming forth.  Read about it here: Road Unicycle Set-up and T7 Modification.

The other article is also something that we are starting to have to think more about, unicycle gearing.  As technology improves, it becomes more difficult for beginners to figure out concepts like gearing when there are multiple factors involved.  Klaas Bil, a unicyclist from Holland, has devised a way to think about unicycle gearing which I found quite interesting.  Read about it here: Total Gear Ratio.

Upcoming articles: Packing a unicycle for travelling

Team Rollercoaster: Panama Expedition

Congratulations to Team Rollercoaster: Vince Lemay, Steve Relles, Roland Kays, Brad Stratton, and Perry Woodin, who are about to embark on an Adventure Unicycle ride across Panama, from the Atlantic to Pacific Ocean.

These riders are the winners of the inaugral Kris Holm Evolution of Balance award, given to the most difficult, creative, and remote mountain unicycling adventure annually.

Watch out for plenty of jungle unicycling action to follow!

Team Rollercoaster Expedition Website

Merry Christmas!

Hi everyone,

This will be the last AU post for the year.  Ok, there hasn’t been many, but we only got going again not long ago.

I hope Santa has been good to you all, and brought many unicycle parts to fill your Christmas stockings with.  Failing that, get a copy of the latest Unicycle Magazine.  There is a 2010 calender with a couple of photos from Adventure Unicyclist.  What better way to plan out your unicycling year?  Oh, and there’s an Ken Looi interview in there too 😉

I’m off on a ride, and to work of some of that excess Christmas pudding.  Just think, if the fat guy learnt how to unicycle, the reindeer would have less to carry and there would be fewer carbon emissions.

Have a very Merry Christmas from all of us at Adventure Unicyclist!

See you again next year.

Ken and the AU team

Induni 2009, The India Unicycle Tour

As many of you know, the next Adventure Unicyclist tour is in North Eastern India next year.  We are still taking registrations for Induni, but it closes on 1 Jan 2009, and we have a maximum limit of 24 riders.

If you are interested in coming, please get in touch with us now and I’ll give you more information about the tour.  More information and also rider profiles and unicycles are up on: www.induni.adventureunicyclist.com

Here is what Grasshopper Master, our tour leader has to say about Induni:

“Our tour takes us to the north east of India to a fantastically diverse region that
borders Bangladesh, Bhutan, Nepal and China, each of them never more than 100
miles away. This diversity is reflected in both the landscape, which ranges from the
steaming plains near Bangladesh, to the world’s 3rd highest mountain,
Kanchenjunga, but it is also evident in the people and religions we’ll see. Bengali tea
pickers, Bhutanese religious sculptors, Nepali corn vendors and Tibetan prayer flags
are all to be found at this confluence of cultures.
All this contrast makes for plenty of legwork, and starting in the plains, we’ll work our
way up through to the foothills until we’re close enough to the snow-capped peaks of
Sikkim that it’ll feel like we can just reach out and touch them. ”

Hope to see you in India next year!

Ken Looi

1000km across the roof of the World

Another epic journey completed by unicycle.  This time it’s Steve Colligan, a pretty well known unicyclist from the UK.  Steve has ridden 1100km, with 12,000m of climbing, and 15,000m of descent, from Lhasa in Tibet to Kathmandu in Nepal.  This gruelling challenge was to raise money for a charity in Nepal.

Read all about it on Steve’s Website: Unicycle Steve

The writeup and photos are on this RSU thread

Well done Steve!

Around the world by Skateboard

It’s ironic that one of the first updates on the new Adventure Unicyclist website is about something other than Adventure Unicycling. However, a friend of mine sent me a link to Rob Thomsons website:

14 Degrees off the Beaten Track

I had a quick look and found myself spending the best part of an hour browsing through some pretty cool pictures and stories of his 12,000km journey around the world….by Skateboard!

Maybe someone could convince him to ditch a few wheels.

Adventure Unicyclist…we’re back (kind of!)

Alright, for those of you who have been waiting for this, I’m slowly getting there. The original Adventure Unicyclist website was cranked out in MS Frontpage, without me really knowing what I was doing. But it seemed to work (even if I used Comic Sans Serif font!). It was taken down last year in preparation for a brand spanking new AU site, but due to various circumstances arising, that rather expensive project is permanently mothballed.

Adventureunicyclist.com was my personal website, but I’m turning it into a general website for MUni, Unicycle Touring and all things unicycling and adventure related. My personal website is now on www.kenlooi.net

In the meantime I’m going to throw everything I have into wordpress (because it’s quick and easy). In fact so easy I’ll probably keep AU on WordPress until I get around to redesigning the site proper. I will migrate most of the old AU site content onto here, and also add some articles and tutorials on Adventure Unicycling you might find useful and hopefully entertaining.

Check out our upcoming Induni Unicycle Tour in 2009

Ride on!

Ken Looi