The first time you try to ride a recumbent, it’s an interesting experience. You see, your body knows how to ride a bike. It’s an almost entirely automatic and reflexive process. Unfortunately, a lot of those reflexes don’t work on recumbents.

The first time you push off, the bike falls over. Your body is used to having a lot more help in staying balanced than it gets on a ‘bent. So you try again, and use your steering to stay balanced, but the steering seems hypersensitive, and you start over-correcting madly. Then you try to turn around, and everything goes to hell.

It just feels completely odd, and even though most folks are wobbling around successfully in just a few tries, it takes quite a while longer before it becomes natural.

Nestofdragons, a Belgian recumbent homebuilder, filmed a coworker attempting to ride one of his bikes for the first time. It took him a few tries.

Try number 1:


Try number 2:


Try number 3:


If you are interested in riding a recumbent bike, keep trying. It’s worth it.