A blog about anything and everything BikeTrials by a wannabe biketrial rider, who is 50++ years old, that was born in Sibu, grew up in Miri, studied in Canada and now settled in Bangi. Yet he is still searching for that something... maybe the Spiders from Mars.
You have just got to check out Echo Bikes' newly updated bikes! For one thing, they have consolidated all their trial bikes into the Echo Bikes' website.
Adamant, Zoo, Gu and Echo trial bikes are all under one site! Another big surprise (at least for me), was the release of the 24" Urban Street trial bikes!
Echo Urban Street 24" trial bike.
Adamant Urban Street 24" trial bike (grey).
Adamant Urban Street 24" trial bike (black).
Dun they just look beautiful? Begging to be ridden? Personally, I have not tried a 24" before. I am so damn curious how it would ride like.
For the Adamant and Echo Urban Street trial bikes, except for the frames, all other parts are combination of Echo SL and TR series parts and components. Anyway, the SL Series are supposedly to be made of higher grade materials and lighter, which translate to more expensive... LOL.
So far, I could not find any videos on the 24" bikes. I guess they are still new to the market. Let me know if you come across any. Appreciate it.
There is just no easy way to learn the Pedal Up. I have watched countless videos and read various tutorials from forums around the net. This has gotta be one of the most difficult technique for me to learn in BikeTrial.
I was quite methodical about it. I had surmised that in order to learn the Pedal Up, one must start with the Zap Tap, then the Touch Up (on a 20"... LOL) and then progress to the Pedal Up. They all required one common thing... proper foot positioning on the pedals.
Proper Pedal Footing
I am a right-footer, which meant my right foot is the fore foot on the pedal. And so the starting position for my right foot pedal would be at the 4 o'clock position and my left foot would be at the 10 o'clock position.
Here is a video of a Pedal Up shown to me by Wong Xu (from China). We were riding at the Putrajaya Bike Park two weekends ago and I took the opportunity to ask him to execute the move as slowly as he possible could.... LOL. See the following video, he just made it look so easy!!! LOL.
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Since Wong Xu was a right-footer as well, it was easy for me to see how it was done.
Dood! You Gotta be Dynamic
Later that week, I tried to follow the steps shown in the video. I could bring up the front wheel, but I just could not commit totally to pedal kick with my right foot when the time came. It required a very dynamic pedal kick on the right foot to bring the rear wheel onto the wooden pallet's edge.
Chicken Shit and Then Some
I chickened out always at the last moments... LOL. In fact, I had decided to forgo learning the Pedal Up altogether.
Yesterday, I was learning the pedal hops, pedal kicks and basically riding the home-made sections for an hour or so. I did not know what made me do it (I was dead tired and ready to call it a night)... without thinking, I decided to just try the Pedal Up. I managed to bring the front wheel up and committed to pedal hard on my right foot. To my surprise, I managed to bring the bike up and land two wheels on the double stacked wooden pallets.
Stoking the Adrenalin
The lack of sleep (woke up at 6:00am that day), tiredness and whatever fatigues went away that moment... LOL. I had already taken off my shirt and ready to pack it in... and now... I was totally stoked!!! Wow! I felt the motion and the "groove" of the move. I just had to continue. I wanted my body to remember the move!!!! HAhahaha.
And so, I called Joel to bring out the video camera to document my Pedal Up learning progress... LOL. The following video showed only the successful attempts out of probably a hundred failed or pathetic attempts... HAhah.
A 2 minutes video of a few hours of learning. The still elusive Pedal Up.
Today, I was supposed to go riding with Wong Xu, Syarul and Aris in the Shah Alam Lake Park. But the rain got the better of us and I decided to cancel it. Instead, I went looking for a pair of screws long enough to install the Echo brake booster for my 26" (which had major brake problems).
Anyway, after that I decided to continue learning the Pedal Ups as shown in the video above. Now, I have a bruised buttock, injured elbow and a fistful of blisters and callouses.
Almost got a cramp on my left thigh while writing this blog... need a break. Gonna skip riding tomorrow.... I hope... LOL.
Last Saturday, I went riding trials in the Putrajaya Bike Park with Wong Xu of China. He had only been in Malaysia for about a month. He found my phone number from the BikeTrial Malaysia website and called 2 weekends before. I could only arrange for us to ride last Saturday.
We met up at the Cyberia Condos next to MMU and headed to the Putrajaya Bike Park. He told me that he was expecting to find a lot of BikeTrial riders in Malaysia. He was quite surprised when I told him that I know of less than 10 riders. Anyway, Wong Xu had been riding for more than 5 years in China. So, I took this opportunity to ask him to coach me on some of the skills.
Rulong Trial Bike. Made in China. Wong Xu has modified his hydraulic brakes to use water instead of hydraulic fluid. Cool!
The Pedal Up
I have been trying to get this right for the longest time, stacking up the wooden pallets, viewing all the related videos, and still not getting anywhere. And so I decided to put off learning and try later. But now I have Wong Xu to explain and show me, I am stoked again... Hahahah.
Wong Xu doing the pedal up as slow as he can to show me the technique.
Here in this video, Wong Xu explained to me how and where my foot should be placed.
The Pedal Hop
I had never really taken this technique seriously as I never had any problem learning it. That is, until riding on undulating or rocky sections... LOL. All this while, I had been learning and practicing on flat and level ground. Now I have a new respect for it!
Wong Xu showing me how I should practice the pedal hop. He said that this would be a very useful technique, especially when used in combination with other techniques. Useful for riding many different types of terrain, especially rocky sections.
Gapping on Rear Wheel
I have been practicing minor "gapping" on stacks of wooden pallets. But my goal was never to see how far I could gap. I was still trying to get comfortable with balancing on the rear wheel and pedal kicking across pallets. Until Wong Xu told me, I had not realised that for long distance gap, you do not actually use the pedal drive train to gain the distance, but rather just simply compressing the rear tire just as you make the jump. I gotta keep that in mind when I decide to try it... LOL.
Wong Xu demonstrating the long distance gapping technique.
All said and done, since that day, I simply did not have the time to ride. This whole week had been super rushed and busy. Anyway, Wong Xu called me up today and asked if we would be going riding this Saturday. I have decided to take him to Bukit Komanwel to ride some rocks... :-)
If anyone of you are interested, please let me know.
Btw, the Putrajaya Bike Park is still under construction. They are still working on the dirt jumps and ramps overlooking the skate park area. We were riding at the skate park area. Quite a nice place to practice.
It has been hard. After trying to learn the "zap tap" and "pedal kick" for a while now, I decided to up the ante a bit. And so I decided to move the stacks of pallets wider apart and try pedal kicking over the gaps.
Felt very scary at first, but after doing it for a few times, I became more confident. And then I got the idea of playing with different camera angles to try make a video "movie" of me trying to ride a section. Check out the edited and the unedited videos below... hilarious!
This video is made from a few videos I took from different angles and then composite together. This is the first time I tried doing something like this. Lots of fun!
This video shows the four videos before being edited and combined into a "movie".... LOL.
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