Flowing - new style?

[wickedbob]

Originally Posted by jeremy r

hey, i want to start a new style of riding i call flow.

Heres what it basically is:

• on a 24 or 26
• idea is to cover some distance with as much flow as possible
• perform tricks cleanly along the way
• not get off at any point

so essentially like street with less tricks and more focus on getting a-b.

What do you guys think?

I have a feeling justin will enjoy this.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

you guys are missing the point.

Mikefule has the idea, just a bit less sarcasm.

Too tired to explain now.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

yeah, justin, you have got it.

The idea is to combind aspects of a bunch of different styles.

From muni and trials, the speed and and avoidance of hops when possible.

From coker, the a-b aspect.

From street the environment and types of obstacles...

Muni with an urban/street aspect fits the description perfectly.

Maybe it wouldn't be called flowing, that was all i could think of. :d




open your mind to new possibilities.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

kinda, yeah.

I will try to make a video, but it is kinda hard, because the idea is to not go back and try try try try the same thing, but to get it the first time, or if you don't the next ride.


Of course, nothing says you can't stop a flow ride for some big wheel street or trials.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

i will make a video soon i hope.

In the meantime, lets change the name to flux riding. I think that sounds cooler.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

flux is a constant state of change.

You are constantly moving in this type of riding.

The environment can be anywhere, so that can change.

It can be done on any wheelsize, although 24 and 26 would be best imo.

Everything can change, thats why i picked it.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

there are over 10 people who either agree, or think it could be a cool new style, in this thread.

Get out if you dislike it, in the meantime i'm going for a flux ride.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

i guess, i just dislike the term freeride. Haha.


+ flux sounds soo much cooler :d

Originally Posted by johnfoss

the basic idea is to ride obstacles without hopping. Could be done with any unicycle, but at the time andrew was hyper-focused on cokers and may have been temporarily unaware of the existence of other wheel sizes.

at the time he was writing all about that i was a big fan, because i'd been doing basically the same thing with my muni on the trails for years, just not particularly thinking about it. But on a muni it's more of a watered-down version of trials, because you can do so much more if you're a good hopper. On a coker, hopping is ill-advised so rolling trials makes more sense. But in either case, it's a style being applied to the obstacles.

Note: Andrew used to ride 20" or 24" with bradley bradley & me back in 1986 or so, where we developed the game of sumo together, so he's not new to innovating in unicycling.

Nope, it was always more of a sense of disbelief or blank stares, at least out on the trails where we were doing it.
And hopefully they will be nice to you as well, and let you ride in there on unicycles!

Blecch! I don't think that one will be popular. Not sure if it's only me though. Once upon a time my dad came home with this 1975 chevy chevelle station wagon that he'd paid too much for at a used car place. The thing was baby-poop brown and generally a piece of crap. We called it the flux mobile. If flux means "constant change", perhaps it's not the best description of something that's supposed to be more, uh, flowy. I like the idea of calling rolling street; building upon what we already know street to be.

But in either case, it probably needs more of a definition to it, which can be accomplished with videos, so people generally understand what you have in mind. I like the idea of flowing lines, not necessarily for everything, but for the skill and mastery they show when done well.

Not right. No matter what we do, the biking world still thinks we're on another planet. No danger of getting "too close." but if other sports have terminology, components or systems that will work for us, why not use them?

But calling it freeriding might not work, as that's already kind of defined (at least for bikes). Urban freeriding might work, if it's a good fit for the style of riding intended. But my understanding of it, based on the discussion so far, is that it's based on what we now call street, so the name should connect to that somehow if possible. It's a subset of street riding, right?

What's called street is street, and it involves lots of hopping, too many crankflips, and otherwise lots of stuff other than the subset being described. And i'm sure a bunch of street riders who've uploaded videos are now really, really mad at you for telling them they could have done better.

Originally Posted by johnfoss

too many crankflips, yup! This is a rider's opinion.

of course you can do as many as you want, and potentially win a street competition. I would just rather see more of a mix of skills.

Not sure why you don't respect the small/tech/flatflip riders, but good for you on the rest! I wish everyone automatically agreed with me all the time. You must be quite a leader in the world of street...

Originally Posted by johnfoss

this is where it gets tricky in judging the competitions. Some riders are focused on big tricks (or small tricks) while others focus more on flow, style, etc. It's important for us (the judges, rule-makers, promoters of the sport) to be on the same page on the rules and judging, so everyone understands/agrees on what actually makes a "good" street performance.

Of course when not competing, you can do whatever you want and nobody can say it's wrong.
That's because he's got style, and high standards for himself. It's one of the reasons you can be sure his videos will be worth watching, while you may not get the same consistency from other riders.
Uh, yeah. If i had the tools to convert vhs to digital i'd post one of my (ancient) freestyle videos to annoy you. that's all we had back in the 80s. Freestyle and standard skill. There are so many more choices today! But the more you have, the more they tend to overlap, which leads people to argue about what one style is "supposed" to be compared to others. Freestyle doesn't have this problem because it's about everything. Actually, there are many sub-styles in freestyle, but you don't hear much discussion of that in these forums. Standard skill, of course, has no style at all. Street is a little more restrictive than freestyle, but not too much. Flat is even more restrictive because it has to be flat.

Originally Posted by biggestbtc

so i found out what style i ride. That's cool.

Originally Posted by johnfoss

generally agreed, but more important is that they be good judges. Of course you have to know a lot about street to be a good street judge, but you can also be a good judge if you're good at *watching* street. We know this from freestyle judging, which has been around long enough for us to have some experience with it. Some of the best judges are crap riders, but they watch a lot of other riders and know a good performance when they see it.

What makes it hard with newer events like street (and open x that came before it) is judging when the full meaning of what makes a "good" performance is not yet completely formed. We have the judging rules, but there's only so much you can put into words. Also, when new, these sports tend to change faster than the rules do, so a bit of flexibility is needed as well.

The other hard part about getting good street riders to be good judges, is that there aren't very many, and almost none that have "aged out" or are otherwise not competing if they're that good.

Flashback:
At the world's first street competition (california muni weekend 2004) we had very mixed judges, but we also had very mixed riders, and only 10 or so, so it was easy for the whole audience, which included the judges, to reach an almost perfect consensus on who was better than who. There were only a few minor discrepancies among the judges. I was the chief judge. Nowadays it has gotten a lot harder!

Originally Posted by gild

flowflux is to street as

xc is to muni

.

No?

Originally Posted by jeremy r

the muni element is not the mountain part of it. It is the wheelsize and the way obstacles are handled, rolling over anything you can.


Heres an example from a flow/flux/freeride run i did today:

Was riding with decent speed. I came up to a staircase with the intent to jump, but my cranks were super off, so i just rolled down it. I then saw a slightly larger than average curb, and did a massive rolling hop tire grab up it. Rode for a few minutes, came to a cross walk, began to ride across when a car came by so i idled for a bit. Rode up the street, and found a nice 2 foot diameter manhole. Did a 180 over it, kept on riding.

I did not get off once, i just rode place to place doing a trick if i feel the need, or want to.

Not focused on tricks, not focused on just riding, not focused on rolling down/over stuff.

Its weird, you will have to see the video when i am able to make it.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

i rode it today, it is its own style.

Don't knock it before you try it.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

and the reason why is i'm not 100% sure what it will be in the end yet, so who am i to say, if you want to ride this style, you must do du du dud dudu dud ududud. I'm sharing my vision, and a few other riders have responded very well to it. Not everyone though, and thats the way it should be. Not everyone cokers, does trials, street, flat, etc, etc. That doesn't mean if it is a style you might dislike you have to try to make everyone think your way.

John, that isn't at you in specific, at everyone.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

nice, just get a 24 or 26 now .

Does everyone see how it isn't street 100%, but incorporates other style elements?

Originally Posted by jeremy r

in case you couldn't tell, i know that you are joking

Originally Posted by jeremy r

sam, i do agree it is not new, but it is new in the sense of say, kombucha. Kombucha is a drink made 1000s of years ago, but noone commonly drank it. Now, it is becoming super popular in the us and europe. I think it is disgusting, but thats besides my point.

I don't care if i am creating it or not. Heres what i know. It is super duper fun to ride this way, and not many people do. I want to change that :d.

The idea behind urban freeride/flow/flux is to be able to do what you do with 100% flow, and then work out from there, so it is less progress based (but still is) and more refinement based.


I also don't think it is 100% different from street, just different from it, to the point where it isn't quite the same.

Its like:
Cycling = plants
unicycling = fruits
urban freeride = honeydew
street=canteloupe

hahahaha, they are still very close, but different enough to be very noticeable.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

the whole melon analogy is, that although they are very close, they are discernably different.

Originally Posted by biggestbtc

i like the sound of this style. Just throw a hookworm on your muni and go flying through town, jumping off/over/on any obstacles in your way.

Originally Posted by jeremy r

yes, it is very much like parkour.

Thanks for your help :d.

Originally Posted by ascenxion

and to clarify a little further, like you tried to get across before, and the difference between this and "flowing" street, is that in street (or at least i assume, i'm not a street guy, and so maybe i don't know) even as "flowy" as possible, you are still doing a "line". You are doing riding in between tricks, as opposed to tricks in between riding.

Now, again, i say that i just thought this was already known as urban muni, so i don't know if it needs it's own classification, other than a name change to flux, cuz i do think that's a good name, props. but i don't ever see videos of this. You do on a bike, many bike trials videos are along these lines. So, if anything, i think that maybe this would be a subset of trials instead of street, as some have pointed out. And i would like to see videos of this style as opposed to street, so again, perhaps it would still be considered street, or trials, or urban muni, but it is definitely different enough for me to consider one type of video over another better and more fun to watch.

I think really, there are five different subsets of riding on the road:

1) distance riding, which could probably be split into many different categories, but whatever.

2) freestyle/flatland, i confess, that i don't really know the exact difference between these two, but i'd put anything in this category that is essentially doing tricks in mostly the same spot, not using any of the surrounding "features".

3) street, doing tricks using "features". Following a line or routine and trying to perfect "moves" and tricks.

4) trials, getting from point a to point b, in a mostly hoppy fashion, along a quite technical route with possibly some tricks thrown in.

5) flux, getting from point a to point b, in a much faster, rollier fashion, with many less technical moves and tricks along the way.

Now, that's just an opinion, and perhaps unicyclists are quite good enough yet to actually perform flux, but there is definitely a difference on foot, and i'd certainly argue that there is a difference on two wheels between street and flux, and again, i'd think flux is closer to trials anywho. So, why can't there be a difference on one wheel?

Oh, i forgot to add, to make john happy i think the most appropriate way to "show" that this is different is in a competition setting. As someone pointed out earlier (someone also pointed out parkour, i didn't mean to not give you credit, i just forgot) i think a good competition would be a race. And along the way there are all sorts of different features to do tricks with, and you choose what you want to do on the fly, course sight unseen. The tricks that you choose to do are worth a certain amount of time, and all of the trick time is added up and subtracted from your total race time. So, you could just bomb the run as fast as possible, without doing any tricks. Or you could do as many tricks as you could, and if you can do them fast enough, your time would be possibly much less. But if you fall or mess up, you are going to lose time.