This would have helped a lot: if only I had received the instructions shown in the video linked below when I first began working at riding on two wheels!
Here you see my hybrid\’s \”cockpit\” when I was able to do longer rides on a BIcycle. By then I was using a Camel-Bak, and I\’m probably about ten miles from home!
But when I first got that hybrid, it took some doing to get going! It would have been easier, I believe, if I had had someone to talk me through me this. It sure would have helped; I could have skipped the \”glide biking\” stage, and might have gotten the hang of pedaling sooner.
If I were to try to teach someone to ride, I\’d approach it as I demonstrated in the video. I\’m not strong enough to hold up someone, even a child, on a bicycle. An adult, needless to say, would not want to be held up. I, for one, would have felt exceedingly foolish!
Some advice I could add: watch out for the front wheel. It tends to swing around, and it took me a while to remember to hold the left (i.e. front) brake to prevent it. I had had fenders added to the hybrid before I even wheeled it out of the shop, and the ends of the supporting struts were sharp. They cut through the rubber caps, and more than once cut my legs!
The effort paid off, though. Now I can hardly imagine being unable to ride a bicycle!