kgantz
Member
Well, I received my new Quest 559 late in the week and had it assembled and adjusted for riding today. It rained all day until around 3:30 PM. I had many concerns (have fewer now) about learning to ride the Quest because I am 54 years old, 6'1" and am long time out of shape at 255 lbs. I have never ridden any kind of recumbent bike and it has been about 4 years since I've been on any kind of bike other than a motorcycle.
I must have watched every YouTube video dealing with riding Cruzbikes and everyone makes it look so darn easy. Of all the "first ride" videos I've watched, it seems like everyone almost instantly raises both feet, puts them on the pedals and off they go. Some are very mildly wobbly and some are straight as an arrow as soon as they start.
I started out in my company's parking lot which had the added bonus today of being half closed to car traffic, which would be non-existent on a Saturday anyway, due to some scheduled tree planting which also didn't take place because it rained most of the day. Anyway, there I was "Flintstoning" away and that didn't seem so hard but I guess I did it long enough that my fat legs got tired. When I was ready to try and use the pedals, I found it very difficult to raise my legs, keep the bike going straight and actually get both feet on the pedals before I was careening out of control. I tried this at quite an intense rate for 6 minutes and thought I would never be able to successfully pedal the Quest. Although I had adjusted the boom to my heel and the knee looked nicely bent when I put my foot in the pedaling position, I felt like the pedals were just too far away so I adjusted the boom from 11 to 10.5. I tried again and I was riding! I can't claim that I was steering exactly where I wanted to go, but I did manage to not hit anything.
I soon noticed that my shoulders were getting tired and I knew that it was because I was wrestling the Quest into submission rather than actually riding it. I knew this is a tendency that some new Cruzbike owners experience so I tried the open palm method of gripping the handlbars and was not finding that very easy to do either. Over the course of about an hour, I did improve, but I am still a little baffled by what it should look and feel like to ride a Cruzbike successfully. I seem to have a permanent "S" built into my steering while pedaling and can only really maintain an arrow-straight line when coasting. My range of best control seems to be between the speeds of 9 and 12 mph and if I get much slower than 8 mph I don't trust that I will maintain my balance through a turn.
Since other people have mentioned that sitting up helps them at slow speed, I tried that and it did help but I think it helps because it unloads the pressure your back is exerting on the seat back. I noticed that there were times when the seat back felt like a giant windshield wiper moving back and forth across my back in turns. If I was pressing hard against the back, it made turning more difficult. It made me wonder if that's why I see some people removing their seat cushions. That shiny seat back would then just glide across one's back. I would miss the soft cushion though.
I was able to keep my feet on the pedals long enough to travel about 7 1/4 miles in an hour in that parking lot but I really have to work on making the bike go where I want it to go and figuring out low speed turns and really all turns in general. It almost seemed like I had to pull on the handlebars toward the direction I wanted to turn. It felt completely opposite to a motorcycle or standard bicycle where you push the handlebars on the side you wish to turn into to establish a lean and then let the handlebars and rest of the bike follow through the turn on the bank angle you established. IE we use counter steering on motorcycles and standard bicycles but I swear I was doing the opposite on the Quest.
Well, here are the details of my 1st little ride. I hope that with a little more practice I'll actually be able to leave the parking lot and head out to see what lies ahead. http://cyclemeter.com/34e7cd97c7041877/Cycle-20131019-1655?r=e
I must have watched every YouTube video dealing with riding Cruzbikes and everyone makes it look so darn easy. Of all the "first ride" videos I've watched, it seems like everyone almost instantly raises both feet, puts them on the pedals and off they go. Some are very mildly wobbly and some are straight as an arrow as soon as they start.
I started out in my company's parking lot which had the added bonus today of being half closed to car traffic, which would be non-existent on a Saturday anyway, due to some scheduled tree planting which also didn't take place because it rained most of the day. Anyway, there I was "Flintstoning" away and that didn't seem so hard but I guess I did it long enough that my fat legs got tired. When I was ready to try and use the pedals, I found it very difficult to raise my legs, keep the bike going straight and actually get both feet on the pedals before I was careening out of control. I tried this at quite an intense rate for 6 minutes and thought I would never be able to successfully pedal the Quest. Although I had adjusted the boom to my heel and the knee looked nicely bent when I put my foot in the pedaling position, I felt like the pedals were just too far away so I adjusted the boom from 11 to 10.5. I tried again and I was riding! I can't claim that I was steering exactly where I wanted to go, but I did manage to not hit anything.
I soon noticed that my shoulders were getting tired and I knew that it was because I was wrestling the Quest into submission rather than actually riding it. I knew this is a tendency that some new Cruzbike owners experience so I tried the open palm method of gripping the handlbars and was not finding that very easy to do either. Over the course of about an hour, I did improve, but I am still a little baffled by what it should look and feel like to ride a Cruzbike successfully. I seem to have a permanent "S" built into my steering while pedaling and can only really maintain an arrow-straight line when coasting. My range of best control seems to be between the speeds of 9 and 12 mph and if I get much slower than 8 mph I don't trust that I will maintain my balance through a turn.
Since other people have mentioned that sitting up helps them at slow speed, I tried that and it did help but I think it helps because it unloads the pressure your back is exerting on the seat back. I noticed that there were times when the seat back felt like a giant windshield wiper moving back and forth across my back in turns. If I was pressing hard against the back, it made turning more difficult. It made me wonder if that's why I see some people removing their seat cushions. That shiny seat back would then just glide across one's back. I would miss the soft cushion though.
I was able to keep my feet on the pedals long enough to travel about 7 1/4 miles in an hour in that parking lot but I really have to work on making the bike go where I want it to go and figuring out low speed turns and really all turns in general. It almost seemed like I had to pull on the handlebars toward the direction I wanted to turn. It felt completely opposite to a motorcycle or standard bicycle where you push the handlebars on the side you wish to turn into to establish a lean and then let the handlebars and rest of the bike follow through the turn on the bank angle you established. IE we use counter steering on motorcycles and standard bicycles but I swear I was doing the opposite on the Quest.
Well, here are the details of my 1st little ride. I hope that with a little more practice I'll actually be able to leave the parking lot and head out to see what lies ahead. http://cyclemeter.com/34e7cd97c7041877/Cycle-20131019-1655?r=e
