Do you listen to music while cycling?



have never ridden with music on as i think i would find it distracting messing about with the player and just a distraction in itself - i already spend too long looking at my gears to check whether they are doing as i wish. i do however have song lyrics floating around my head all the time while i'm riding and certain songs seem to pop up during certain conditions. eg. take it easy by the eagles when on hills, fond farewell by elliott smith when i'm knackered. is this normal or am i going mad!??

p.s. i do have music on when on the rollers but not on headphones
 
I have to say that I would get killed if i listened to music. There are too many public roads where I live. If I couldn't here the traffic I would probly die.
 
Hey Trekker,
If you've got an MP3 player with some kind of line-in recording capability you can tape BBC radio programs off the net. I used to live in the UK and since moving to America haven't been able to find much of a substitute for the BBC. So I tape programs to make my gym workouts bearable. The only bad part about this method of taping is you have to do it live (so a 45 min program takes 45 min of continuous taping). Do they really broadcast Radio Australia in CA?! (I'm an Aussie).

Cheers,
Jess :)
 
I have a little walkman and listen to tapes, I also have my dads mp3 player. I like to listen to bob dylan and the rolling stones while riding. listening to the stones really gets me motovated!!! [you should try it, i dont know many people that dont like the stones] the stones rock!!!!!!!!!
 
I used to, but now I am deaf...If you think listening to music is dangerous, you ought to try a narrow country road as a deaf rider!
 
I always have tunes with me. That said, I have the volume control right up next to the headphone so I can turn it up, down or off as appropriate. Keep it real low on city streets, turn it off crossing intersections, crank it up on the bike routes. It's all about common sense. I recently did a Century in Nevada 108 Degree heat. Built a playlist for my iPod called "Desert Hot". It was absolutely perfect & the ride wouldn't have been the same without it. After my THIRD flat , Gram Parsons pops up on the iPod doing "In My Hour of Darkness". After my FOURTH flat & heading home on my last tube, Bon Jovi pops up with "Living on a Prayer". Perfect....
 
Depends where I ride...But I love house music and driving progressive trance and drum and bass.
 
It's a bad idea. Don't do it. You need to be aware of your surrounding. How do you get the head phones on? Are you wearing a helmet? Can you hear the person behind you yelling when they are about to pass? There is a time and place for everything and radio's and bicycles don't mix.
 
I'm a mountain biker and newb to road rides, but where I ride (little traffic, cars doing 80k+, no lights, etc.) I usually can't hear the cars until their beside me. I find the wind very loud and don't know how you can be going at a good pace and hear the cars anyway? I tried riding with the MD, volume low, and it blocked most of the wind noise and cars sounded about the same.

Is it just me???
 
I DID just buy a Dell Jukebox 20gb model. This thing is freakin' awesome!! I've never gotten into the whole MP3 thing, but that is going to change fast!

I've got over 300+ cd's, so I need to get them all converted to MP3 format to load it. Gonna take some time.

I'm on vacation next week, so I'll be trying it out then. I'll report back on my experience.
 
danielwilgocki said:
It depends on my mood. Sometimes I'll use my Ipod when I ride solo. Never in a group ride.

Agree. Only when I commute, and that's on back streets in Sydney, across ANZAC Bridge and the Harbour Bridge. Had a smoke and a couple of beers one night before a midnight commute home with some lazy sounds on, clear night, bright moon and all that. What a GREAT ride that was.

I've started listening to some trance on the trainer. That works! It's a bit wierd after a 45 minute session at 6:00am though.
 
I almost always ride with my iPod unless it looks like rain. But I listen to Hendrix, Zeppelin, AC/DC, Grateful Dead, Clapton, and The Doors.
 
Yup. Here's the playlist

Butthole surfers - Who was in my room last night
Devo - Whip it
Eric B and Rakim - I Aint No Joke
Ministry - Burning inside
Suicidal Tendencies - Can't bring me down
Bush - Machine Head
Crystal Method - Busy Child
Machines Of Loving Grace - Butterfly wings
Herbie Hancock - Rock It
Run DMC - Peter Piper
Foo Fighters - Hero
Stone Temple Pilots - Sex type thing
Rob Zombie - Dragula
Soul Coughing - Super Bon Bon
Helmet - FBLA II
Green Day Hitching a Ride
Social Distortion - Ring of Fire
Mighty Mighty Bosstones - The impression that I get
Ministry - Jesus built my hotrod (extended mix)
Kiss - Detroit Rock City
Van Halen - Running with the Devil
AC/DC - Back in Black (My song to sprint to)
Butthole surfers - Goofy's concern
Madness - One Step Beyond
Marylin Manson - Beautiful People (Full metal Jacket mix)
NoFX - Please play this song on the Radio
Apollo 440 - Stop the rock
Blink 182 - Song 2 (techno remix)
Meat Beat Manifesto - Orginal Control II
Prodigy - Smack my ***** up (remix)
Rollins Band - Shine
 
I almost always have my iPod going when I go for a long ride - the earphones are actually not great quality, but that is good because that means I can still hear all of what is happening around me too.

I listen to all sorts of stuff - I just have it shuffle randomly through my whole collection (currently some 2,500 songs) :)
 
Well, week went well, only problem that I had was my brand new freakin' ear "buds" had the right one die on the second ride.

So I bought a different pair of earphones for $5 from Staples, and they worked fine.

I had it set to "genre" "metal" and "shuffle" .......... plenty of Tool, Maiden, Metallica, Slayer, Metal Church, Dio, and Black Sabbath among others. Only had a few times out of my 160 miles I did for the week where I had repeat of songs.

VERY happy with my purchase and the resulting hours of music.
 
Daremo said:
I had it set to "genre" "metal" and "shuffle" .......... plenty of Tool, Maiden, Metallica, Slayer, Metal Church, Dio, and Black Sabbath among others. Only had a few times out of my 160 miles I did for the week where I had repeat of songs.

VERY happy with my purchase and the resulting hours of music.
Nice to hear :) I just recently won en eBay auction for a 512MB player at a great price, so there'll be less repetition than my current 128MB one that's got horrid battery life..

Looking forward to being able to actually manage music playlists with WMP and getting it to transfer & transcode to lower quality automatically (with all the ambient and wind noise while riding, I don't think top-notch audio quality is necessary)
 
b1_ said:
Do you listen to music while you ride? what do like to listen to? What's your player?

I've got some wrap around Sony MDR-70s which work well with a helmet on, and an iRiver iHP140. I also wear ear plugs to cut down on wind and traffic noise which still gets through anyway.

I listen to techno and trance and it sure does add to the cycling experience ten fold. Ever toured in a foreign country and crested a mountain pass on a perfect day while listening to trance? - incredible, and highly recommended.

Does anyone else use music as their cycling fuel?
haha your just like me I listen to ayumi/elt japanese trance but i don't put the volume on high cause listening to traffic is more imporant haha
 
When I announce at our local BMX track I get to choose the tunes, luckily we are co-sponsored by Bettie Rocket Records so I crank up the volume and watch how much it gets the kids going. The right music can have a postive effect on your riding, they seem to like the Rap/Core and SK8 punk best. Their fav cd's are Cr33, Shop11phoenix, ESO, and Like David.
 
I always listen to tunes unless I'm riding with a friend who likes to chat. Even then, the headphones come on when we hit the hills. We ride on bike paths/low traffic areas, so cars aren't really a concern - when I'm on a road with a lot of traffic, I turn the volume down.

The right music definitely motivates my performance.