Things you only do once

[Wowbagger]

Attempt to break wind quietly at work after a night of beer and curry.

I would have thought that a beer-and-curry-inspired fart would be so noxious that no-one with an ounce of humanitarian feeling would want to commit such an act within earshot of anyone else!

[rower40]

Perform an instinctive Haul-turn on a tandem.

While on the back seat. 

[Bledlow]

Attempt to freewheel on a fixed.

Attempt to freewheel on a track bike.

...on a corner at the velodrome

With audience? 

[Butterfly]

Perform an instinctive Haul-turn on a tandem.

While on the back seat. 

Yeah - I wasn't popular for that, either . But a possible cafe is a possible cafe...

[Greenbank]

Attempting to ride with no hands (arms out stretched sideways) and no feet on the pedals. (Think star jumps.)

Upon balance-FAIL the instinctive reaction was to bring my feet back in to regain balance. I stuck my foot in my front wheel.

[geraldc]

Cycle over a cattle grid one handed holding an ice cream cone, and with the first vibrations coming through the handlebars, decide to grip harder with both hands.

[Recursived]

Attempt to do a U-turn on a cattle-grid (not myself, but have witnessed someone else doing it, luckily at v. low speed).

[Andrew Br]

Attempt to do a U-turn on a cattle-grid (not myself, but have witnessed someone else doing it, luckily at v. low speed).

I've done that. With an audience 

[LEE]

Grab a handful of MTB rear brake to perform an impressive rear-wheel slide and turn down a steep hill on a Belgian MTB.

FYI.  Most continental bikes have their brake levers reversed when compared to UK.

There's no way to perform an impressive front-wheel slide and turn down a steep hill, I just ended up eating Belgian top-soil about 1 millisecond after I started the impressive manouvre.

Hopefully Belgians do the same thing when learning to ride a motorbike.

[JStone]

cycle cross-handed - though the resulting plaster cast was a good ice-breaker conversation piece for my first week at secondary school

[Pancho]

Ride along Ryde pier on a thin tyred road bike.

Not me. But I was behind the poor sod when his wheel, inevitably, slipped down into the wide gaps between the planking. Not a good start for the Round the Island ride.

[MacB]

spend time trying to locate the irritating intermittent squeak coming from your crank area. Discover that it's due to a crank/trainer ineraction and moving your foot slightly stops it.

[Greenbank]

FYI.  Most continental bikes have their brake levers reversed when compared to UK.

It's because they drive on the other side of the road.

The majority of hand signals are performed with the hand nearest the middle of the road (right hand in the UK). This leaves the left hand on the bars and so it's better to have this hand operate the rear brake rather than the front (to avoid panic braking dumping you onto the road).

If you swap to the other side of the road then the majority of hand signals are performed by the left hand, so it's best to have the right hand operate the rear brake. US bikes have their brakes cabled up in the same way because of driving on the right.

Hopefully Belgians do the same thing when learning to ride a motorbike.

In general (i.e. ignoring oddly setup motorbikes, scooters and mopeds), motorbike controls don't swap around between countries. Rear brake will almost always be a foot pedal on the right hand side. Front brake is the right hand lever. Left hand lever is the clutch. Left foot does the gear selection.

[John Henry]

Unclip left hand shoe from clipless pedal. Lean right.

 

JH

[rogerzilla]

Ride straight into a high-sided kerb at 20mph, just to see what will happen.

(answer: you get flipped straight over the bars and eat pavement.  I'm still glad I did it though...it's all experience)

[kcass]

Ride over 5 foot high mound of earth at speed. You take off, land on front wheel, go over handlebars and go temporarily deaf (you only find out its temporary when your hearing returns later that day)

[rogerzilla]

Compete in a "who can do the biggest skid*" competition after 4 pints.  My knee took three weeks to heal properly after being repeatedly wrenched.


*I managed 270^o.  The kids in Cannon Hill Park could do 360^o *without* sticking a foot down, and keep riding afterwards 

[Basil]

I just love seeing kids mucking about and having GRATE FUN on bikes.

Meanwhile, back on topic.

Automatically turn round with lots of arm and finger gestures on hearing someone hoot behind me.
Turned out to be a bus driver who was holding back and offering to shepherd me as I negotiated a tricky lane change and right turn.  

[campagman]

Honk your hooter at somebody slowly crossing the road ahead. Got a bit nearer and realised it was an old granny with a zimmer. I felt so bad for the rest of the ride.

[1gear]

Look behind for too long when way too tired, resulting in me running along the kerb then dumping me and the bike onto the grass verge. Luckily, just grass and not tarmac. I was doing about 20mph aswell, after going way too hard for 60miles.
Luckily, i fell off fine and just slid along the floor and was just left with a small cut on my knee and a stiff neck.

Try to race a motorbike off from traffic lights on my way home from seeing my now GF(might have been going out then, i cant remember now)
This ended in me folding a chainring over on my fixed, and being stuck 15miles away from home, on a weekday, with my mum at work, didnt know where my dad was, mum didnt know where i was, neither did my dad.
Was a tough call to my dad.

Try to race a car after he had overtaken me to stop at traffic lights. Rolled right so when the lights went back to green i could just power off. Foot unclipped and sliding along the floor with my new iPod in my pocket was not fun.
Was off on the way to see my GF.

Im not sure if i did learn the first time or not

[alexb]

Try to clean a running bathroom extractor fan with one (now fractured and lacerated) finger.
Doc says the nail will grow back in a month or so...

[SandyV]

Try to clean a running bathroom extractor fan with one (now fractured and lacerated) finger.
Doc says the nail will grow back in a month or so...

Or ... turn a handheld (stick) blender on while cleaning it and almost take off the whole top of the finger  - 2 years ago and never got all the feeling back but lucky to have the finger I guess

[Greenbank]

Try to clean a running bathroom extractor fan with one (now fractured and lacerated) finger.
Doc says the nail will grow back in a month or so...

Or ... turn a handheld (stick) blender on while cleaning it and almost take off the whole top of the finger  - 2 years ago and never got all the feeling back but lucky to have the finger I guess

Or use a (kitchen) mandolin without the plastic guard (whilst probably still drunk from the night before). Lopped off the top of my little finger, deep enough to chip the bone. Two days in hospital and a skin graft.

[Blue Manc]

Chop some chillies, neglect to wash your hands, then go for a pee.......

[Bledlow]

.... or rub your eyes.