Tire Balls and more interbike madness

Maybe some day I will visit this for real, but until then I get to anxiously await internet bulletins for things like tire balls and Brooks roll up panniers- so sick, but almost 300 bones
DiLuca sent home??? Bettini being questioned WTF. Cycling governing bodies need to get it together.

Lonnie Youngblood African Twist 45 Loma

I guess Lonnie is showing some of his African roots on this by shouting "Swahili" and "Ungowa" through out the record. Where "Ariba" fits in? That I don't know.
Has kind of a Stax sound to it. "Live" recording? You tell me. 1967 on Loma Records.
He kicks up the sax antics on side two aka Part II. Good groover.
Not surprisingly Funky16Corners has already written this up along with the entire genre of African titled soul and funk 45s. They kick ass.
Lonnie Youngblood will be turning up again soon. Mainly for his connection to the shady world of early Hendrix rjavascript:void(0)
Publish Postecords and a legendary record man named Johnny Brantley.
You have been warned.

The Hippies are Trying 45

I guess you can only write so many songs about drinking,loving,fighting, and being down on your luck. Junior Wells hit that wall around the time he dropped this single. Basic blues rocker, You got to tell Junior how you can be so mean to the hippies?
Flipside "You're tuff enough" is an uptempo horn driven enjoyable, but forgetable bar rocker that is also the title to the LP this is taken from. Perhaps this is the song that motivated Tigerman Kim Wilson to ask "Ain't that tuff enough"? Mercury/Blue Rock records.
If you dig this be sure and try and track down Otis Spann's Blues for Hippies 45. I can only hope there is a whole sub genre of post-woodstock hippie related blues records to find......

Thanks Coach

The boom in sports coaching has been pretty wild. You can benefit from a structured training plan and good feedback, but there are a couple things that make me crazy
1.Coaches who race-how can I trust you? Are you going to make me as fast as I can be or just a little slower than you?
2.McCoaching. Why drop money monthly for a plan with no personal feedback or assessment?
3.Ex-Pros who now coach, but never used coaches or training plans in their racing days? Then brag about it in interviews?
4.Half truths-coaches always tell you not to starve yourself and to "refuel" etc, but then you read coaches blogs that talk about skipping meals and cutting weight.
Cycling always comes down to a weight to power ratio. There isn't anyway around it.
Rule number one will always be "shut up and suffer". If you do that long enough, you might get better.



So with that all said I guess there are only two options until Jens Voigt turns coach. Nega Coach is probably suitable for 90% of aspiring racers.If you are uncomfortable with Nega-Coach, that leaves Greg Hill. He was wining before you were born. BMX you say? But of course, think about the BMX roots of some of today's top pros (Robbie McEwen for example.

Cycling Odds and Ends

1.Congratulations to Sammy Sanchez!!! He strikes at the Vuelta and pulls within 11 seconds of Cadel. That should keep it interesting. Menchov looks ready to win this one again, but this time get to celebrate. He is not the most exciting rider to watch, but then again neither are his competition. Sastre and Evans have always been in the top, but seemed to lack that defining attack.

2. Wheel Prices???? Improvements in frames trickle down and prices drop over time, but if you look at wheel prices they stay frustratingly high. Where is the trickle down effect? Most prebuilt sets can't competed dollar for dollar against hand built, but the median price seems to be trending towards $1500. Rotational weight or not that is a lot of loot.

3.Landis. Shut up already, you only make cycling look more crooked and stupid to boot.
It pisses me off that off all the 2007 cycling highlights (Ballan at Flandes for instance) Landis and Sinkewitz getting hit by a dog are what 99.9% of the world will remember and ask me about. Same thing with skateboarding. Off all the unreal action, all you hear about is Jake Brown's slam. I would rather people knew nothing than just these things.

4. De Peet. Peter Van Petegam retired last week. Hats off to the "black man of brakel" being a hairy fellow, I can feel some sympathy for this classics killer. The changing of the guard is almost done-hardly any pros that were around when I started riding are still in the game.

5. If Hincapie wins a stage race does anyone care?? I realize this is a little old, but I was on vacation. Tour of Missouri-not so much in the excitement dept.

Old School BMX

More sidehack madness and pay attention a tandem!

Sidehack Racing

The good old days never get old to me