The one thing I don't like about it, however, is that I'm too scared to wear my headphones during a ride.
For some reason I will blast music on a run, not caring if I can hear anything around me (dangerous, I know; the hubbs is AWESOME at the safety lecture, thankyouverymuch). On the bike I am scared you-know-whatless to not hear a car come up behind me. Maybe it's because I am riding with traffic and I run against traffic. Maybe it's because I am a much faster moving object on the bike whose motion will need to be changed using a higher force due to my higher acceleration (thanks, Newton), and this force can send me hurtling through the air much like a projectile with only gravity to act as an unbalanced force to make me slam into the ground. Or maybe it's because I'm a total moron with a subconscious death wish. Who knows?
I do miss my music during bike rides, because it really does motivate me. I couldn't have gotten through the last 3 miles of my marathon without it, because it allows me to go inside the music and forget about my suffering for a while. Without music, I would probably realize that what I was doing was totally insane and sit down in the middle of the course, trying not to cry and begging passing runners for food. Or a ride back to my car.
But if you have a music snob in your life, you realize that not all music is created equal. You see, I will listen to whatever will motivate me to keep putting one foot in front of the other, whether that music be deemed "cool" or not. I guess you could say that I have a lot of musical guilty pleasures on the old iPod shuffle that I use on my runs. Here are a few of those gems:
- "Disturbia" & "Please Don't Stop the Music" by Rhianna
- "Call Me Maybe" by Carly Rae Jepsen
- "Safety Dance" by Men Without Hats (That song is old. I hope they found their hats by now.)
- Pretty much anything by Lady GaGa
- Any flamboyant song by Erasure (which is pretty much all of them)
You see, when I'm running, I really could care less about lyrics. I only care about the beat and the overall tone of the song. Sometimes I want the driving beat of some crazy metal song, especially when I'm slamming out some speed work. Other times I need the music to back off and help me enjoy the long run. When I'm racing, I don't remember what songs come on half the time because I am focused solely on meeting my goals and I just need some background noise in order to get that focus and accomplish them. I just switch the ol' iPod on "shuffle" and let the music play away while my mind goes somewhere else for a while.
So I guess you could say I'm not really thinking on a run. I'm just running so I can think clearly later.
Or just take a nap afterwards. I'm still tired from Ragnar, and all I can really think of right now is naps.
