Anatomy of an adult bike-riding lesson

Learning to ride a bicycle as a adult can be an adventure.  It forces you to step out of your comfort zone. When you are a kid everything is new. Learning to ride a bike is just one more new challenge. But as adults  we are to being in control, or at least to being well-practiced at what we do. Because the dynamics of teaching adults to ride can be different from teaching children, some organizations, like the Washington Area Bicycle Association and the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, offer adult-only classes. Sometimes League Certified Instructors (LCI) give one-on-one lessons.

Every story of someone learning to ride a bike is different. Here’s one:

A young man in Milwaukee is planning a trip to Mexico to visit a girl over the Fourth of July weekend. She wants them to go on a bike ride together when he gets there. One problem: he doesn’t know how to ride. Duly motivated, the young man finds local instructor, Dave Schlabowske, using our LCI-finder. He emails Dave on Saturday and by noon on Sunday he’s in the middle of his first lesson.  Fortunately, Dave was careful to document the experience and tell the story on his blog. Enjoy.

Photo of an adult first-time rider by Dave Schlabowske