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France Picks Up Gold Freestyle Medal at Unicycle World Championships
France won its first gold medal of the Unicycle World Championships when Pierre-Yves Billette was a popular winner of the individual freestyle competition. Billette’s routine combined a high level of technical skill with a very fluid and crowd engaging performance. Despite a couple of small mistakes on very technical manoeuvres, Billettte was able to score enough points to beat a flawless performance by Japan’s Ryohei Matsuka.
Matsuka moved smoothly between the different elements within his programme but could not match the technical variety of Billette. He was though delighted to have imporoved upon his fourth placing in the pairs on Wednesday night.
Swiss David Maillard backed up his gold in the pairs with a bronze medal performance. Based upon Michael Jackson’s ‘Beat it’, Maillard’s routine combined a high level of acrobatic manoeuvres and unicycling skill with a well choreographed routine. Unfortunately a few uncharacteristic errors marred his performance.
In a format that is very similar to ice skating, the unicyclists are given four minutes for their routines and they are judged on a combination of fluidity of movement, the variety of movements, level of difficulty and audience interaction.
For those new to unicycling it was very easy to forget that the competitors were cycling on a single wheel as their movements seemed to be as smooth as those of an ice skater. The most pleasing for the competitors’ was the excellent support given by the Wellington public.
“Who would have believed that we could pack out a TSB Arena for a unicycling event” said Event Co-ordinator Lynne Klap. “It gives me incredible pleasure to see the surprised look on the faces in the audience when they witness the beauty and sheer skill of these athletes. We are unlikely to ever see the best ice skaters in a competition in Wellington yet here we have the unicycling equivalent. And all for free”
The artistic freestyle unicycling concludes in the TSB Arena with the group freestyle at 7pm on Saturday January 2nd. The programme then moves on to more of the outdoor events including the 10km criterium, the trials and the cross country.
Unicycle World Championships Results
Freestyle Men
1. Pierre-Yves Billette (France), 2. Ryohei Matsuda (Japan), 3. David Maillard (Switzerland).
Freestyle Women
1. Satoni Sakaino (Japan), 2. Rina Tachibana (Japan), 3. Yuka Sakaino (Japan).
Unicyclists countdown to New Year!!!
It’s the last day of the year, and the last day of the decade. Hundreds of unicyclists spent the day enjoying it in Wellington with members of the public. UNICON XV ran a public ‘learn-to-ride” workshop, which had dozens of people turning up to Frank Kitts park to try out unicycling! Many were able to get on, and even go a few metres, after expert instruction from the worlds best unicyclists.
We had a live Unicycle Demo for the public at Civic Square, with The Berkeley Uni-basketball team showing off their best moves, our Street Champions doing various jumps over each other, and The Japanese Freestyle Team providing a crowd pleasing performance.
For the first time in Unicon history, hundreds of unicyclists from around the world gathered to count down the New Year in style!
Check out the UNICON Gallery
Swiss Men Win Artistic Pairs at UnicycleWorld Championships
Crowd favourites David Maillard and Gilles Saudan from Switzerland took out the artistic pairs at the Unicycle World Championships with their rock themed performance. Combining a high level of skill, entertaining theatrics and incredible strength, the Swiss pair entranced the capacity audience at the TSB Arena in Wellington. The pair differentiated their performance form the other nine finalists with their lifting, especially when Maillard held Saudan in a horizontal position above his head while circling the arena.
The second half of the Swiss routine had the crowd calling for more as the Swiss stripped off items of clothing while performing unicycling manoeuvres that were technically extremely difficult. Maillard and Saudan were the reigning champions having also won in Denmark in 2008.
The Swiss were the clearest example of a difference in style between the very fluid balletic style of the Japanese and the European focus on the technical unicycling skills.
In unicycling mixed, women and men pairs compete against each other rather than in separate divisions. In a format that is very similar to ice skating, the pairs are given four minutes for their routines and they are judged on a combination of fluidity of movement, the variety of movements, level of difficulty and audience interaction.
For those new to unicycling it was very easy to forget that the competitors were cycling on a single wheel as their movements seemed to be as smooth as those of an ice skater.
The artistic skating continues in the TSB Arena with the individual expert on Friday January 1st and the group freestyle on Saturday January 2nd. The organisers are expecting to again fill the TSB Arena after the success of the pairs competition.
Results
Artistic Expert Pairs
1. David Maillard and Gilles Saudan (Switzerland) , 2. Kaito Shoji and Yuka Fujimoto (Japan), 3. Satomi and Yuka Sakaino(Japan).
Kaito Shoji and Yuka Fujimoto
Triple gold on track for Japanese Unicyclist at World Championships
Seisuke Kobayashi 800m Final. Photo by roadcycling.co.nz
Multiple world champion Seisuke Kobayashi, from Japan, was the star on the track at the Unicycle World Championships in Wellington today. Seisuke won the 800m, 400m and 100m though he had to work hard to hold on to his 800m title. An unexpectedly bold challenge from young Swiss unicyclist, Philipp Henestrosa, looked like causing an upset after he led the field after the first lap of 400m.
An aggressive start by Henestrosa quickly stretched the field and had Kobayashi, German Niklas Wojtek and Henestrosa in a tight group in front down the back straight. Round the corner at the 200m mark Henestrosa grabbed the lead by two metres and the possibility of a major upset seemed on. However, Kobayashi re-assumed control down the back straight on the second lap as the young Swiss rider’s legs started to tire. The superior strength of Kobayashi enabled him to hang on to win by 2.5 seconds from fast finishing Wojtek. Seventeen year old Henestrosa managed to hold on for fourth.
Kobayashi also won multiple gold on the track at the past two world championships held in Switzerland and Denmark.
In the women’s track events only a silver medal by German Laura Gienapp prevented a clean sweep of all medals by the Japanese. The 100m provided the closest finish of the day with only nine hundredths of a second separating Japanese unicyclists, Mayoko Deguchi and Anna Misawa, with Gienapp in between the two.
Results Women:
800m: 1. Natsume Yamamoto (Japan) 2min13.70sec, 2. Yui Sugahara (Japan) 2:14.23, 3. Minami Watanabe (Japan) 2:14.86; 400m: 1.Saori Yazawa (Japan) 1min 1.19sec, 2. Natsume Yamamoto (Japan) 1:01.90, 3. Minami Watanabe (Japan) 1:02.68; 100m: 1. Mayuko Deguchi (Japan) 14.27sec, 2. Laura Gienapp (Germany) 14.32sec, 3. Anna Misawa (Japan) 14.36sec
Results Men:
800m: 1. Seisuke Kobayashi (Japan) 2min 5.60sec, 2. Niklas Wojtek (Germany) 2:08.15, 3. Masataka Seto (Japan) 2:09.36; 400m: 1. Seisuke Kobayashi (Japan) 56.39sec, 2. Niklas Wojtek (Germany) 58.51sec, 3. Hiroaki Okayama (Japan) 58.75sec; 100m: 1. Seisuke Kobayashi (Japan) 13.09sec, 2. Hiroaki Okayama (Japan) 13.62sec, 3. Niklas Wojtek (Germany) 13.67sec.
World Record Equalled at World Championships
American Max Schulze equalled the world record for the unicycle high jump when he cleared 1m 15cm at the Unicycle World Championships today. In front of an excited crowd that surrounded the high jump arena, Schulze cleared the 1m 15cm record on his first attempt and then had the bar raised to 1m 22cm as that is one cm above the unofficial record that has reputably been cleared out of competition. He missed on all three attempts but then had the bar raised to1m 25cm for the crowd and successfully cleared that though it cannot be considered for the record books.
The 1m 15cm record is shared with Joe Hodges from the UK.
UNICON XV is Officially Open! Parade of Nations and Powhiri
Today was a pretty special day in Wellington, New Zealand! Unicon XV kicked off with a parade of nations. Approximately 650 Unicyclists from 23 countries rode down the Wellington Waterfront to Civic Square, where we were greeted with a Powhiri (Maori Welcome), followed by speeches from the local Maori, the Mayor of Wellington, and John Foss on behalf of the Unicyclists.
Check out our gallery for photos of todays action.
UNICON XV made it into the TV news on both main national channels. Here are the video links: 3 News and 1 News
The local newspaper also has an article: Dominion Post
A nice article and great photos on: roadcycling.co.nz
Don’t forget to bookmark the UNICON XV Facebook page for updates, photos and comments from UNICON participants!
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Registration packs are ready!
Big thanks to all the volunteers who turned up at Lynne and Arthurs place yesterday to put together 750 registration packs….all stuffed full of goodies including chocolate, muesli bars, drinks, t-shirts and more! It took four hours and almost 20 volunteers to put this all together.
We also strung up the greenstone medals- they look fantastic.
See you at Unicon next week!
IUF 2010 Rulebook
For those of you patiently waiting for the latest version of the IUF Rulebook (to be used in UNICON XV Competition), it has finally been approved for release by the IUF board. Many thanks to Connie Cotter and the IUF Rulebook committee for all their hardwork. It is a refinement of previous versions of the IUF Rulebook
Please read the rules carefully, in particular equipment requirements (safety gear, wheel and crank sizes) if you are not familiar with IUF competition:
Countdown to UNICON XV
Just over one more week to UNICON XV!
IUF Rulebook 2010
UNICON XV will follow IUF Rulebook 2010. It will be up soon on the Unicon XV website. You may also browse the Rulebook at the Information Office at TSB Arena when UNICON starts.
UNICON XV Schedule
We have published the final programme of all events and workshops on the UNICON website.
Please check the events notice board daily for new workshops, or last minute changes to programme due to bad weather.
If you still like to host an impromptu workshop, let us know too so we can announce on the events notice board.
Downhill Gliding
Downhill Gliding will be held on 30 December from 12.30 to 17:00 at Newtown Park.
Open Stage Night Saturday 2nd January 9:30pm
Hosted by the inimitable Vinyl Burns, this is a night where you, the participants of UNICON XV are the stars of the show. All and every kind of act is invited to perform on stage, in the style of Renegade Shows at juggling festivals, in front of a friendly audience. Any kind of skill, unicycling or otherwise, is permitted and encouraged. Got a cool new trick that you’ve been working on, or something that is just plain goofy? We want to see it! It could be a song, a joke, some weird party trick you can do or even a rehearsed stage act. So think about what you might like to do on stage and see you there for a great night’s entertainment!
Merry Christmas and see you soon. And don’t forget to wear your team t-shirts for the Opening Ceremony.
UNICON XV in the news
We have been in a few news article recently.
Here is yesterdays Dominion Post, with Amrei Schindelmann from Germany (Freestyle and Track Racing Competitor) showing off to some kids at two local primary schools:
Unicyclist a stand up performer
And in the paper recently:
Pedalling benefits of just one wheel
If you are in New Zealand already, grab a copy of the latest North and South Magazine too! There is another Unicycle interview in there.
Keep us updated if you have any UNICON related media articles, wherever you live