For the Autistics Who Cannot Cycle

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I'm not the only one?

It took me forever to get the hang of riding a bike. I didn't get my driver's license until I was 33, so I rode my bike or walked a lot before then. I had only one bike I could ride without hands. That was an old office clunker in stationed Germany. I thought it would be cool to ride like that, but any bike I had was impossible.

Now I just ride my Pro-Form TDF indoor trainer, as my balance is kaput these days.

I stuggled for my entire youth and i still cant

I took longer to go from training wheels to no training wheels when I was a kid, but did eventually learn to ride a normal bike. I enjoyed it, but now, several decades, and two bad knees later, I can no longer do the rotating motions involved in pedaling a bike. My knees are just too bad for that. I looked into knee replacement surgery, but there is a risk of blood clots, which can cause strokes, heart attack, or problems in your lungs. The Big Pharma solution to that is to put people on dangerous blood thinners, with dangerous side effects. I also researched alternatives to knee replacement surgery, and there are several safer alternatives that are still in the testing stage. I decided to wait till they are available to the general public, and then I can go with one of those safer therapies to improve my knees. In the mean time, I've been getting along with two offset handle quad canes for several years, and a couple of months ago I bought a rolling walker, which helps even more than the canes do, so I really like it. It even has a fold-down seat, breaks, and an under-seat basket. I'll do okay till the therapies I'm waiting for are here.

For those not yet able to ride a bike, I do suggest you keep trying to learn how to ride one. When I was able to ride a bike I went all over the place, including some of the parks in the areas where I lived. I also rode to nearby towns to go shopping. A couple of times I even rode my bike to nearby temp work assignments when my car was in need of repairs.

Thanks for sharing suggestions

That is lovely.

A nice method, and this is genuine learning to ride. I have put the link up again so it should come up as a youtube film.



Someone made a comment about tricycles. I have had two large wheeled adults tricycles in the past (About 15 to 20 years ago. I am now in my 40's).
Adult tricycles do need to be balanced and more so then a bicycle, but it is a different type of balancing as the forces that need to be counterbalanced come at you in different ways. It is a complete myth that adult tricycles of the conventional form dont need balancing.
However, a recumbant tricycle will need less balancing as ones body weight is (Depending on the design... Is pointless to go for a recumbent that sits the body high up as it defeats the object of getting a recumbent) lower so there is less leverage for the forces of nature to act on.

Bicycles and tricycles do need to be balanced but in totally different ways. Tricycles need far more counterbalancing which is why I would not buy an adults tricycle with a high up crossbar as the crossbar prevents one from using ones whole body to counterbalance them at speed. Likewize, I would not buy a tricycle where both brakes are on the front wheel. Also a bit about tricycle frame design. Some tricycles are conversions from ladies bicycles with two parallel, or almost parallel tubes on the mainframe of the trike. This is the weakest point of any tricycle design and the point which has the most stress. What happens is that these two tubes work against each other until they fracture.
The best tricycle designs tend to be a wide single tube that is braced with another tube at the bottom to form a little triangle and is braced at the top with a supportive brace. The tube will flex so needs to be a material to allow for this flexing.
Another weak point with tricycles are the rear wheels. Normally they are driven from a single rear wheel (Even if they look like they are not) and the driven wheel needs to be on the left if one lives in a country where they drive on the left, and needs to be the right if living in a country where it is driven on the right. Do not buy an imported tricycle that has the drive on the wrong side, because one of the things one is fighting against when riding a tricycle is the camber of the road and the single wheel driven on the lower side of the camber counteracts this to add to the stability of riding the machine. If one has the wrong wheel driven, it is always going to be a fight against hitting the curb as the drive AND the camber of the road pulls you in towards the curb.
Now a good tricyclist is used to this but usally ends up with an aching back on longer rides as one is basically riding at an angle and having to lean slightly to counter balance the camber of the road.
I have taken corners at speeds cars dare not take and my whole body is nearly touching the ground as I took them to counter balance my body weigt, and get it down low to make the corner. It is a fight between the rear wheels sliding (And one ending up doing a complete 360 degree spin!) and worse is having the rear wheels suddenly grip where one is flicked the other way and one is airborne!
Bicycles avoid all this camber lean issue so if one is able to learn to balance, a bicycle is an easier machine to ride.
Only a very large industrial tricycle is able to carry a greater load then one can carry on a bicycle as the trike carrying capacity is in the area above the axle and gears inbetween the rear wheels, and on the front forks for smaller panniers. A pair of bicycle panniers with the ability to put a tent across the top of the panniers, I found to have more room, though unless one has a touring bicycle which is designed specifically to be stable carrying weight, a tricycle is a more stable weight carrying machine.
The main advantage of a tricycle is that it has the ability to come up to a road junction and one just sits there! One does not have to put a single foot on the floor!

Tricycles are heavy to ride so speeds are averaging around 5mph lower then a bicycle over a distance.
They also need a larger area to store then a bicycle.

There are plusses and minuses in both machines. I hope this is useful. Some people who don't get on with bicycles do manage tricycles, and going off a tricycle and onto a bicycle one is at a big advantage, but I have seen many bicyclists crash when jumping onna tricycle as they are not the same! They handle and balance in different ways! For a cyclist who wants to ride a tricycle, I say forget it has handlebars and pretend it has a steering wheel and you will have a better chance of not crashing on your first attempt!!

Finally... For an inexperienced rider of both machines, a bicycles friend is speed. A tricycles enemy is speed! Bicycles need around 8mph or more for the gyroscopic effect to hepl you balance on the bike. A tricycle for a beginner needs to be ridden slowly as things can get out of hand rather quickly. Do not worry. Tricycles work fine at very low speeds! Bicycles don't. They wobble when one goes slow! As a bicycle speeds up the wobbling goes as the gyroscopic effect takes over.

All things do mountain biking also my favorite:lol:

Is this a common problem with spergs?

I learned to ride at 12 (didn't have a bike until then, WTF parents) but now mtbike often. So long its sufficiently steep and dangerous I will pay attention and won't crash, but if it gets boring I'll think about something unrelated and eat dirt.