[hpv] Rough-Terrain Unicyclist (part two)
John Snyder
On weekend days Peck takes his first ride soon after
sunrise, usually with the dogs. He rides along
Resurrection Bay, the sharp summits of the Chugach
Mountains forming a backdrop. He pedals in fits and
starts: a powerful flurry to ascend a flat-topped rock, an
immediate ninety-degree turn on the top, a momentary
pause to consider the drop-off, and a careful hop down
to the sand. His arms provide counterbalance, waving
in controlled, tai-chi-style movements. The tip of his
tongue flits in and out. In rough-terrain cycling, top
speed, even going downhill, is about six miles an hour.
"It's not exhilarating," Peck says, "but a series of little
joys." He cuts through a puddle, cracking a thin film of
ice, and chugs up a dirty snowbank. He falls twice,
gracefully, and climbs back on.
A UNICYCLE is both more and less than half a
bicycle. It has a solid hub and lacks any gears,
meaning that one rotation of the pedals produces one
rotation of the wheel. This is called direct drive, and is
the reason a unicycle is limited to low speeds. You
can't coast, but you can ride backward.
"Unicycling is intrinsically a slow-motion event," Peck
says. "It is more about rhythm and mental dexterity than
about strength -- it has more in common, I feel, with a
chess match or a Bach concerto than with any extreme
sport. And it's actually very safe -- far safer than
bicycling. I've never had an injury so bad I couldn't ride
the next day. Much of the thrill, really, is in pondering the
ergonomical conundrums. Torque. Pedal separation.
Crank-arm length. Spokes. You need the cycle to be
sturdy, and you need it to be light and maneuverable.
And everything has to be balanced on one tiny axle. It's
nearly insolvable. The five best riders I met at the
California weekend were a physicist, a mathematician,
a neurophysiologist, a computer analyst, and an Intel
executive."
He says this as he rides. If a visitor jogs alongside him (the
pace is perfect), Peck will furnish an hour-long disquisition. He
will expound on Alaskan geology. He will talk about unicycling
up street curbs, and about the appropriate pedal positions for
optimum torque, and about the time he beat a pair of bicyclists
up the steep Crown Point Mine trail. He will insist that it is
possible to unicycle nearly any surface that can be walked, provided
one has the right unicycle.
Peck estimates that he has spent $2,000 on his current
unicycle -- but he is still unsatisfied. About once a week
he visits Ron Henderlong, who helps to improve his
unicycles. Henderlong Enterprises is a welding shop
located in a garage not far from Peck's house.
Henderlong is shorter than Peck but probably twice his
weight. The lower half of Henderlong's face is devoted
to a terrific beard and moustache, between which is
inserted a steady stream of Marlboros. He wears a
patch over his right eye. On the floor of his garage is a
masking-tape outline of a body, with a wrenchlike
shape stenciled in the body's right hand. "That's the last
guy who went into my toolbox without asking," he says.
According to Peck, Henderlong is a genius with hot-rod
engines and cutting-edge unicycles. He customized
Peck's shock-absorbing seat post. The two men can
talk shop for hours; Peck always leaves with a new
idea or two. "I'm tired of giving him six-packs of beer,"
Peck says, "but he won't take any money."
If you really want to make Peck mad, ask him if he is a
clown. "That word makes my teeth set right at the top,"
he says. The image of unicycling, Peck fears,
automatically brings clowns to mind. He has been
asked more than once if he works for a circus. Some
have wondered if he entertains at birthday parties. One
person questioned whether riding a unicycle is an
appropriate activity for a judge. "Unicycling is at the
very bottom of the respectability curve," Peck says.
"Nobody would accuse me of being irresponsible if I
were a skier or a rollerblader. I'm trying to get as far
away from clowns as I possibly can." He tries not to use
the term "unicycle" anymore: too circusy. He prefers to
call what he rides a cycle.
SOMETIMES Peck thinks that if he can only free his
sport from the clown associations, nothing will stop
rough-terrain cycling from becoming the next big thing.
He likes to point out that unicycling has been around
longer than bicycling: one of the original cycles, the
"penny-farthing" with the giant front rim, was little more
than a unicycle with a training wheel. Combine modern
materials with the old idea, toss in a few log jumps, and
rough-terrain cycling should be Olympics-bound:
"Bored teenagers in California will be hopping their
cycles over their Volkswagens."
Then he thinks better of it. "Cycling is safe and slow,"
he says, "and safe and slow are unhip. People want
sports that are like video games. Maybe that's why
there are so few riders." Peck estimates that there are
perhaps 200 muni participants worldwide, including a
club based in England and a Frenchman, Thierry
Bouche, who has unicycled down a 20,000-foot peak in
South America. No company in the United States sells
mountain unicycles (with so few riders, there's no
incentive to manufacture them), and without good
cycles available there won't be many more converts.
The sport is nearly certain to stay tiny. And in Seward,
at least, it is likely to remain a solitary pursuit. Peck
hasn't let this discourage him. Recently his cycling
entered an entirely new phase. He acquired a
contraption called an ultimate wheel, which is a unicycle
without a seat -- just a wheel and two pedals. It looks
impossible to ride, even when Peck is riding it. It took a
month of intense ultimate-wheel training, combined with
the skills of years of unicycling, for him to balance on
the thing. He says he's glommed on to it. Carol says it's
a new level of obsession. He and Henderlong are sure
to re-equip it with sturdier parts. And Peck is already
riding it up and down Alaska's mountains.
Copyright © 1997 by The Atlantic Monthly Company. All rights
reserved. The Atlantic Monthly; April 1997; Rough-Terrain
Unicycling; Volume 279, No. 4; pages 109-112.
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