Choice of books on training for cyclists

[Blair P. Houghton]

I saw these titles in an LBS the other day. Anyone got
any reviews?

1. _The Lance Armstrong Training Program_ (Only didn't buy it instantly
because it only counts 5 of his TdF wins...I'm waiting for the sequel
with the GOOD info in it).

2. _The Cyclists Training Bible_

The titles are approximate; I was taking quick notes into a Palm,
not photographing the LoC page.

--Blair
"Broke 21mph over a lap today with
only 10 weeks back in the saddle.
Maybe I don't need no steenking
books."

 

[[email protected]]

On Fri, 08 Oct 2004 04:58:17 GMT, Blair P. Houghton <[email protected]>
wrote:

>I saw these titles in an LBS the other day. Anyone got
>any reviews?
>
>1. _The Lance Armstrong Training Program_ (Only didn't buy it instantly
>because it only counts 5 of his TdF wins...I'm waiting for the sequel
>with the GOOD info in it).
>
>2. _The Cyclists Training Bible_
>
>The titles are approximate; I was taking quick notes into a Palm,
>not photographing the LoC page.
>
> --Blair
> "Broke 21mph over a lap today with
> only 10 weeks back in the saddle.
> Maybe I don't need no steenking
> books."

Dear Blair,

Amazon has 23 customer reviews for "Cyclist's Bible" and
used copies for sale:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/1884737218/103-9346959-3134222?v=glance

The same goes for "Lance Armstrong Training Program", except
for a numeric palindrome of 32 customer reviews:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t.../103-9346959-3134222?v=glance#product-details

Like you, I'm a careful consumer and look into things before
spending my money. I'm no profligate, lashing out left and
right for books just because I'm an insatiable bibliophile.

No, I want to know if the inexpensive ($28.99) new paperback
edition of Henslowe's diary has scans of the stage manager's
actual scribbling about backstage details in Shakespeare's
era, or ifis it just an editor's transcription? I'm not
about to be sucked by marketing claims--for that kind of
money, I want the real thing!

http://www.amazon.com/gp/reader/0521818664/ref=sib_dp_pt/103-9346959-3134222#reader-page

Oh, no! The sample page shows that the diary is edited . . .

But there are notes and a long alphabetical listing of all
plays mentioned by Henslowe . . .

And look! A line about paying 5 shillings for coshenes!
There were no bicycles back then, so his daughter, Mrs.
Allen, must have bought the cushions to furnish her house,
not saddle-covers for her beater.

There's something about eleven shillings for "ye ovalle
by-o'-pace cranke-sett from S. Browne," but it's continued
on the next page, which is not included in the Amazon
sample.

I hate trying to decipher Elizabethan handwriting . . .

There goes thirty bucks.

Carl Fogel

 

[John Forrest Tomlinson]

On Fri, 08 Oct 2004 04:58:17 GMT, Blair P. Houghton <[email protected]> wrote:

>I saw these titles in an LBS the other day. Anyone got
>any reviews?
>
>1. _The Lance Armstrong Training Program_
>
>2. _The Cyclists Training Bible_
>

If you are racing are racing, the latter book is extremely good.

JT

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[Blair P. Houghton]

John Forrest Tomlinson <[email protected]> wrote:
>On Fri, 08 Oct 2004 04:58:17 GMT, Blair P. Houghton <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>>I saw these titles in an LBS the other day. Anyone got
>>any reviews?
>>
>>1. _The Lance Armstrong Training Program_
>>
>>2. _The Cyclists Training Bible_
>
>If you are racing are racing, the latter book is extremely good.

I'm thinking about racing again, but the way I got smoked
yesterday (I was just past the end of my last training lap
and yipping over the time I'd set, and there was a group
of three guys ahead of me so I spin past them at full
cadence - maybe 23 mph in my current state - instead of
warming-down, and I guess they took offense, because half
a mile later the big one with the Deutsche Bank jersey and
the real-deal gastrocnemeii slams past me doing about 28
sitting down on a short 10% grade I was huffing up...) I
think I'm going to need time and an objective methodology.

--Blair
"Unless you're the guy handing out
the little yellow wrist bands, you
have reason to be humble."

 

[Blair P. Houghton]

<[email protected]> wrote:
>And look! A line about paying 5 shillings for coshenes!
>There were no bicycles back then, so his daughter, Mrs.
>Allen, must have bought the cushions to furnish her house,
>not saddle-covers for her beater.

Were they alloy or carbon-fiber coshenes?

--Blair
"I'm building a couch. It's a fixie."

 

[[email protected]]

On Sat, 09 Oct 2004 00:09:24 GMT, Blair P. Houghton <[email protected]>
wrote:

> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>And look! A line about paying 5 shillings for coshenes!
>>There were no bicycles back then, so his daughter, Mrs.
>>Allen, must have bought the cushions to furnish her house,
>>not saddle-covers for her beater.
>
>Were they alloy or carbon-fiber coshenes?
>
> --Blair
> "I'm building a couch. It's a fixie."

Dear Blair,

Hard to say, but well worth pondering!

In Coriolanus, act II, scene i, Menenius snarls, much like
an angry rec.bicycles.tech poster:

"When you speak best unto the purpose, it is not worth the
wagging of your beards; and your beards deserve not so
honourable a grave as to stuff a botcher's cushion, or to be
entombed in an ass's pack-saddle."

Beard hairs are fibers and carbon-based, not alloy, so the
evidence supports carbon-fiber.

(A botcher was not a butcher, badly pronounced, but a
fellow whose trade was to botch together cushions from
scraps of cloths, quite a few steps down from Shakespeare's
father, who made gloves.)

Elsewhere in Henslowe's diary is the list of stage
properties owned by the Admiral's Men in 1598 that includes
the famous cloak or robe "for to go invisible" worn by
magical characters when announcing their invisibility, such
as Oberon in A Midsummer Night's Dream. Such stealth
technology must also have been carbon-fiber based instead of
metal and has only recently be re-discovered by the U.S. Air
Force.

Carl Fogel

 

[Blair P. Houghton]

<[email protected]> wrote:
>On Sat, 09 Oct 2004 00:09:24 GMT, Blair P. Houghton <[email protected]>
>wrote:
>> <[email protected]> wrote:
>>>And look! A line about paying 5 shillings for coshenes!
>>>There were no bicycles back then, so his daughter, Mrs.
>>>Allen, must have bought the cushions to furnish her house,
>>>not saddle-covers for her beater.
>>
>>Were they alloy or carbon-fiber coshenes?
>> "I'm building a couch. It's a fixie."
>
>"When you speak best unto the purpose, it is not worth the
>wagging of your beards; and your beards deserve not so
>honourable a grave as to stuff a botcher's cushion, or to be
>entombed in an ass's pack-saddle."

If you can't wag your beard, you're breathing too hard.

--Blair
"Speed kills."