Back in the saddle
It looks like it's been a little more than seven months since I've posted here. There's a good reason for that: I haven't been riding my unicycle!
I think I rode for a couple weeks after my last post. Then two things happened: we got into the rainiest March on record here in the San Francisco Bay Area, and my back started giving me more and more trouble. I could wait out the weather, but I decided to work on the back before getting back on the unicycle.
After many visits to my doctor, a couple of physical therapists, a chiropractor, an x-ray lab, and an MRI lab, I'm happy to report that I don't appear to have any problems with my spine or hips that are anything other than your basic 43-year-old wear-and-tear. Unfortunately, I still have back pain, but with what I learned from my physical therapists and my chiropractor, I think I'm making a dent in it. I'm doing some basic yoga for stretching and strengthening, and hopefully that, combined with some moderate unicycling, will keep my back pain at bay.
The good news is that when I got on my unicycle a couple of weeks ago for the first time in over six months, it only took me about 10 minutes to get comfortable and ride decent distances. And when I got back on a week later, I was pretty much back to where I left off six months ago: able to ride my roughly-quarter-mile practice loop with only one stop, able to make 90-degree turns in both directions, and able to make a few more-than-90-degree turns.
So, hopefully, I'll be riding a couple of times a week (for no more than an hour at a time!), and continuing to improve. The next big challenge: freemounting.
I think I rode for a couple weeks after my last post. Then two things happened: we got into the rainiest March on record here in the San Francisco Bay Area, and my back started giving me more and more trouble. I could wait out the weather, but I decided to work on the back before getting back on the unicycle.
After many visits to my doctor, a couple of physical therapists, a chiropractor, an x-ray lab, and an MRI lab, I'm happy to report that I don't appear to have any problems with my spine or hips that are anything other than your basic 43-year-old wear-and-tear. Unfortunately, I still have back pain, but with what I learned from my physical therapists and my chiropractor, I think I'm making a dent in it. I'm doing some basic yoga for stretching and strengthening, and hopefully that, combined with some moderate unicycling, will keep my back pain at bay.
The good news is that when I got on my unicycle a couple of weeks ago for the first time in over six months, it only took me about 10 minutes to get comfortable and ride decent distances. And when I got back on a week later, I was pretty much back to where I left off six months ago: able to ride my roughly-quarter-mile practice loop with only one stop, able to make 90-degree turns in both directions, and able to make a few more-than-90-degree turns.
So, hopefully, I'll be riding a couple of times a week (for no more than an hour at a time!), and continuing to improve. The next big challenge: freemounting.
posted by Rich | 8:52 AM
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