Originally Posted by oldbobcat .
I learned fairly late. The bike I got for my seventh birthday had training wheels. I rode it to the end of the block on the sidewalk and tried to round the corner, downhill and a bit off-camber, and dumped it soundly, putting good scratch in the front fender and starting the process by which the headlamp eventually separated from said fender. By summer vacation a couple weeks later I was confidently on two wheels, racing and exploring with my friends all over our section of town and learning how to lay skid marks by locking up the coaster brake. I clearly remember my next most memorable crash of that year, skidding the rear wheel out in a patch of sand. It hurt but it felt good.