Feh. Forty-something and sunny and what am I doing? The Tour to Nowhere in the living room on our Giant Tempo trainer. An hour and 10 minutes’ worth.
Thank God for my iPod, the Allman Brothers Band and their compilation “A Decade of Hits: 1969-1979.” It’s the best indoor cycling music ever recorded and has seen me through many a grim living-room sweat-fest since its release in 1991.
I wrote a column about it once, if memory serves. I’ll see if I can dig the sumbitch up from the archives, as that will be easier than typing something original with one of my birdies grounded.
• Late update: Well, whaddaya know. Even a dumb dog digs up a bone now and then. But the Allman Brothers album was only one part of the column, not the entire topic. Here it is — a blast from the past, going all the way back to 2002, when we lived on a rocky outcropping in the Wet Mountains, 10 snowy miles from Weirdcliffe.
Mad Blog Media 
There are some advantages to living in BombTown. Excellent singletrack just outside the kitchen door is one of them. I had little interest in whipping up a stiff wind chill factor today on the road machine, so I pulled the long neglected Stumpjumper off its hanger in the garage and took it for a ride around the local dirt.
There is a nearby trail called Barranca Ledge which at times is slightly more than the width of a jeep trail hanging off a sheer cliff good for about a hundred foot drop. I’ve dubbed it the Tour de Suicide, in case anyone around here ever gets the urge to explore the next horizon.
Nice day in the woods, all in all. Will have to find that CD, to go along with my bride’s copy of Live at Fillmore East.
Heck Patrick, that dated screed was more about Funk and 70’s R&B than it was about Southern Fried Rock! It brings back the memories, but still? The Allman Bros. were good, but selling us on them recording “the best indoor cycling music ever” might be a bit much. Especially when you confirm that it was Otis, Martha and Sly who got you moving.
Sort of like me saying that the Oils were the best band ever, but I really like the Monkees.
That last part is complete and utter BS, because the Oils WERE the best band ever. The Monkees just, well, sucked eggs. But to each his own….
James,
That edition of KRCC’s “Vintage Voltage” was a choice piece of happenstance, serendipity, never to occur again. But the Allman Brothers we have with us always. Give ’em a try. Match your cadence to the tunes and see how you feel after 70 minutes. Some natch’al-born intervals in there.
I need to create a trainer mix, is what. “Further On Up the Road” from Eric Clapton’s “E.C. Was Here” is a good 7.5-minute cruise interval that mimics hill-climbing. Maybe some Temptations (“Cloud Nine,” “I Just Can’t Get Next to You”). A little early Green Day (“Basket Case,” “Welcome to Paradise”). The Beatles, of course (“Back in the USSR.” Los Lobos (“La Bamba,” “One Time, One Night”).
Man, I got to get busy digging through the CD collection. Gonna be a long winter, especially with this dislocated digit.
Mendelssohn’s 4th symphony (the theme music in Breaking Away) ain’t bad if you have a classical side. I forget which ones, but back in the snowdrifts of New York and when I broke a collarbone in a Honolulu race crash back in the early ’90’s, there were also a couple Beethoven symphonies I used, timing cadence and heart rate efforts to the movement cadence for those Tours de Nowhere.
K,
We’re a little light on Mendelssohn, but I have Mozart (the “Prague” and “Jupiter” symphonies), Bach (“The Art of Fugue” and “The Brandenburg Concertos”), and of course old Ludwig van’s Fifth and Ninth. Digging Wolfie’s 38th as we speak. Some potential here. …
Khal and Patrick,
The image I conjour up is that of “which side of Led Zeppelin 3 are you putting on the turn table when you want to make out with a girl” scene from “Fast Times at Ridgemont High.” Thanks for the chuckle.
Really, James. My romantic efforts in secondary school could best be described as “Half Fast Times at Alden High”. Was not until college that I discovered life is best lived on sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll.