Best Biking Songs

Music was enormously influential in helping me complete the West Cost bike ride.  I had a bluetooth speaker mounted on my handlebars that played music from my IPhone.  I learned the power of a good song at the right time in one of the early days’ rides when I was riding – typically – at the back of the pack and we were beginning to climb a hill.  Just then Bruce Springsteen Thunder Road started to play and I cranked up the volume.  It was like the afterburners kicked in.  I began to pedal furiously.  I caught up and eventually passed a group of more seasoned riders up the hill.  It was exhilarating.

Of course, going forward, I had to use this device carefully.  I couldn’t keep going back to the same few songs as they would lose their power over time.  But this discovery helped me clear some pretty big hills.

These were my “go to” songs when I had a big climb in front of me:

• Thunder Road – Bruce Springsteen
• Jungleland – Bruce Springsteen
• Sympathy for the Devil – Rolling Stones (Live version)
• Diminuendo in Blue and Crescendo in Blue – Duke Ellington (Live at Newport)
• Casa Loma Stomp – Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra
• Maniac’s Ball – Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra
• White Jazz – Glen Gray and the Casa Loma Orchestra
• Dawn – The Four Seasons
• Walking Blues – Big Bad Voodoo Daddy
• The Love I Lost – Harold Melvin and the Blue Notes

On one occasion, Bruce also helped with a downhill ride.  The good news about climbing hills is that there is often a long downhill ride on the other side.  Once in Oregon, I got to the top of about a 2 mile climb and, as I began to descend, the Springsteen song came on coincidentally that has the refrain, “I’m goin’ down, down, down.  I’m goin’ down, down, down…”  This added to the euphoria and racking up some distance without pedaling.

Finally, I couldn’t get Willie Nelson out of my head when I finally got my new bike and was “On the Road Again.”

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