Simon Berry's 2016.
Unfortunately, the Winter months are usually the quietest part of the year for people like myself. Most of our work is at summer events and festivals, which are all things that take place almost exclusively in the Summer.
Luckily though, 2016 is off to a great start!
After riding into the New Year with some of my best friends (video below), Mike Taylor, Sam Goodburn and I set off for a week of shows at the ExxonMobil Qatar Open in Doha.
We met early on the day of the flight to plan our shows for the week, designing a 5 minute performance that featured both Extreme Unicycling with an underlying theme of tennis.
Our first day was spent setting up the demo rig, and rehearsing our show, before starting 6 days straight of performances, doing between 3 and 5 shows per day, in between Tennis matches. The event itself was great place to be, and the crowds were even better. On the last day, where Novak Djokovic took his first grand slam title, our crowds were huge and had a great time! ...
Our schedule over the week was packed, but we still managed to take some free time to explore historic Doha! I hope we'll be there again soon to continue our adventures there!
Check our our Qatar Vlog on Facebook here:
https://www.facebook.com/223313725448/videos/10153805802055449/
Two weeks later came EUC in Cologne. If you didn't already know, EUC is the Extreme Unicycling Championship, which has been held every year in the same location since 2009! EUC is one the the most intense, and competition packed events on the unicycle calendar, and is a must for anyone who's even remotely into Extreme Unicycling!
Myself, Mike Taylor, Hockey legend Gareth Walkom and Tirryn Nankivel arrived a day early, and were put up thanks to the kindness of Olaf Schote!
Friday began with the flatland competition. I had volunteered to commentate for the first time, which made a change from competing and was great fun.
Impact and Voodoo team member Mike Taylor took second place in Intermediate Flatland, behind Mimo Seedler (A German rider who's one to watch. He's CRAZY) Voodoo's own Rob Terry took the third place on the flatland podium too!
Photo: Winter EUC (Facebook)
Elite flatland led to some of the closest battles I've ever seen! Lorenz Poham took first place, Kornel Auth second, and Pierre Sturney third. It really was a pleasure to commentate such a tense competition.
Photo: Winter EUC (Facebook)
Saturday is the busiest day of EUC, with both Trials, High Jump, and Slopestyle Street taking place.
Mike Taylor once again took another podium, with a joint first place in high jump! Both Mike and Aidan Teleki landed 138cm to pallets, setting a new IUF world record!
Photo: Winter EUC (Facebook)
Trials ran in two phases throughout the day, with some really imaginative and well built lines! Mark Fabian stormed both the qualifiers and the finals, landing 6/7 of the lines in the finals!
Photo: Winter EUC (Facebook)
After the trials finals was street, which took place in the Slopestyle format for EUC. In Slopestyle, each rider has two attempts to qualify by riding a linear course, much like Slopestyle ski/snowboarding. The emphasis is heavily on style and linking tricks together smoothly.
As a result, it's no surprise that Josef Sjonneby sailed into first place! Closely followed by Pierre Sturney and Kornel Auth
Photo: Winter EUC (Facebook)
After the street final, it was time to socialise and enjoy good food, great beer, and the best community in the world! (what unicycle convention would be complete without a Beer Pong competition, too?)
On the Sunday, we were up early to travel back to the UK, we took the bus from Cologne to London, but luckily were so tired we all managed to sleep most of the way!
and now less than a week later, I'm writing this blog post waiting to board my flight to Minnesota, where I've been honoured (or should I say 'honored') to be offered the opportunity to fly out to lead some flatland workshops at Mondo, a Unicycling and Juggling event organised in part by the Twin Cities Unicycle Club.
Photo: Rachel Sindelar
UPDATE:
Mondo was a great event! This was my first time in the USA outside of New York, and I had an awesome time. I need to thank the Twin Cities Unicycle Club, especially the Sindelar and Koehler family, as well as Lars Anderson for their generosity and hospitality over the week, you really made me feel welcome and at home.
Over the 3 day event, I taught a few Unicycling workshops, and participated in the gala show, where we staged a flatland competition. Hopefully there’ll be some video of this soon! In my free time there I went to ride with the Twin Cities Unicycle Club, learnt to ice skate, and spent president’s day in an indoor water park (which is possibly the most American thing conceivable)
To see some more of Mondo, check out this video that Kyle Alviani put together:
https://youtu.be/tNyE8comso4
I’m going to try and make Simon Berry’s 2016 a ‘thing’, so check back on the UDC blog soon for more Unicycling and adventures!
WE SHIP INTERNATIONALLY 
The 2017 EUC (Extreme Unicycling Championship) Summer Edition was held in Hungary at the Factory Sport Arena for the third time. The goal of EUC17 Summer is to give the best event experience for it's participants while also showcasing the sport to the media.
