Speaker 1: 1:30

Well, it's time for Road Adventures with Cycling Men of Leisure, the podcast for cyclists who understand that riding is not just about getting to the destination, but the experience along the way. Now here are the original Cycling Men of Leisure Adam and Michael.

Speaker 2: 1:44

Welcome to Road Adventures of Cycling Men of Leisure. As usual, I am Adam. And guess what? Not only is my good friend from Central Times on Michael Sharp, but we have a friend of the show, executive director, franklin Johnson, with us. Hey, how are both of you?

Speaker 3: 2:01

Good, how are you?

Speaker 2: 2:02

Good.

Speaker 3: 2:04

I'm excited to have Franklin back on. This will be good.

Speaker 2: 2:07

This is going to be really good. This is a much anticipated interview For me. I thought about it all day long and I'm excited Now. It does ruin one thing, even though this is coming out afterwards, but it kind of takes away that midnight watching that video that you put out, and a couple of years I would sit and watch that video. So we are talking about Big Brag 2025. Before we get there, franklin how are you doing?

Speaker 4: 2:37

I am better than I deserve. But before we get started, I'm a big fan of the number one podcast in the world, which is you guys, but the second biggest podcast in the world is the Joe Rogan Experience, and he always starts off guests with a glass of whiskey. And you guys, being as whiskey-ric as you are, I've got two options, but I don't know how I feel about it, because you know you should offer me whiskey and you're wondering how you did that from so far away. But this is actually the cycling men of leisure whiskey. There you go, big brag 2024, and you can see it's unopened. This holds a special place in my heart, so I don't know if I should open this. Or I also have this nice Suntory 12 year that my wife gave me for our 12th anniversary, also unopened, because it also holds a special place in my heart, so I don't know what I should drink for this interview.

Speaker 2: 3:29

You know Heather's pretty special, I would not be hurt if you went with the Japanese Tantori.

Speaker 3: 3:37

As a man who that is a really really good bottle too, and you know, maybe, just maybe, you do that, and then you can say hey, look, did this for you.

Speaker 4: 3:49

Thinking about you. Here it is. This is we'll cheers to Heather for this one 12 years age for our 12th anniversary.

Speaker 2: 3:56

I loved, I loved. Now. Now, uh, for those of you who don't know, um Franklin has become not only a friend but also a friend of the show. Um, we have been lucky enough to meet Heather and um and and um, and we have also followed you on social and you know you're a video guy and you love to do your drone videos and your vacation videos, and I have taken a personal liking in watching your family and your vacations, and so I don't know how your wife does it, but you have a family of kids and she looks amazing and your family pictures recently looks like her hair came out of a perfect magazine. So you're a lucky man, sir, wow.

Speaker 4: 4:41

You now have a new best friend. She loves the hair and gets a lot of compliments on it, so you now hold a special place in her heart for sure.

Speaker 3: 4:50

And we have met everybody in your family, all the kids, except you've got a new one. That's what? Eight months old, nine months old now.

Speaker 4: 4:59

I guess when this comes out, she'll be six months old. Okay, yeah little Ari. She's precious and cute and, yeah, family's growing so it's exciting.

Speaker 2: 5:08

Awesome, glad to hear that. Just a little fact you almost got pulled away from Big Brag 2024, thinking that you were on call at any moment, at any time. You might have been pulled away, but you didn't.

Speaker 4: 5:27

You were actually home almost a week, I think, after Big Brag, yeah, so she was due mid-June. I think she was due June 15th or 16th or something like that. But third kids sometimes they come early. You know, the body knows the process and can get started early sometimes.

Speaker 4: 5:39

So yeah, I was very nervous and we overstaffed and I had way more people there than we needed and kind of gave everybody the rundown of hey, if you see me, run into the truck and hop in and burn out, get down on the road to Atlanta, just know that I'm not coming back, just a good boy. Luckily she came on the 14th and I was able to make it all the way through Bragg, which was good, awesome and now, better than that, her birthday isn't in the middle of Bragg every year, so that's even better.

Speaker 2: 6:09

Yeah, for sure. I mean that would be like well, honey, I'm sorry We'll have to celebrate your birthday when we get home.

Speaker 3: 6:17

So I've got to ask you've opened the bottle? How is the? How's the pour?

Speaker 4: 6:27

It's very good. I haven't had time to savor it as well, since.

Speaker 2: 6:29

I'm trying to concentrate on talking to you, lovely fellas, but but it's very good. Good, I could talk to Michael while you enjoy it. I haven't.

Speaker 3: 6:33

I've got a little here. I'm actually drinking the Regers that you showed the bottle of.

Speaker 4: 6:41

So you know, we've got it represented here too. Kansas City.

Speaker 3: 6:43

That's right, kansas City style whiskey and on.

Speaker 2: 6:47

Monday I had a surprise For my job.

Speaker 3: 6:56

every year I have to go to a drug and alcohol conference, which, okay, that's about as much fun as going to a dentist, but do they give samples or no?

Speaker 2: 7:01

that's the point. And I were in the elevator. It was a very staunch, very, very boring thing. We're all in the elevator, we're at atlanta hilton and, uh, and all of a sudden I actually reached out to franklin. He was on a trip with his daughter skiing, so I was going to try to meet up with him. But we were in the elevator and I looked at my coworker and I said you lied to me. You said this place was going to pass out some samples, and so it was definitely funny. I was pretty surprised that it's in Kansas City, missouri. So, speaking of Rieger's, sir, when I come I would like to please go to Rieger's.

Speaker 3: 7:38

So let me know what you need, if you need picked up at the airport, whatever you need. But we will definitely make a trip to Rieger's and I'll let you ride the slide, so I have definitely done it before.

Speaker 2: 7:48

There's a big, big stainless steel slide there, Franklin, adult size.

Speaker 3: 7:53

And from the second floor to the first floor and it's got like a twist in it. Oh, nice. And so if you don't want to take the stairs, you just hop in the slide and zip right down to the first floor.

Speaker 2: 8:03

As usual, a big note that says no going head first. I believe there might be photographic evidence of me going.

Speaker 3: 8:08

There is you, superman in it, right out there.

Speaker 4: 8:11

I mean at a distillery. What do you expect? Do you expect people in their best behavior?

Speaker 3: 8:15

Well, and to our defense, it was, like you know, one o'clock in the afternoon and there wasn't a lot of people there and the lady likes us, so you know and the rules only apply sometimes, right.

Speaker 2: 8:25

That's right. I tell my employees that all the time. I'm like well, when you did it, you, you broke the rules. I'm like no good leader gets where they are without breaking the rules once or twice.

Speaker 3: 8:37

Tell them you broke the rules for them.

Speaker 2: 8:38

That's right. I did it so you guys could be better. That's right. Well, first let's talk about Bragg. Not big Bragg in May, slash June, but how are all things Bragg? Can I ask?

Speaker 4: 8:58

Bragg is wonderful. We have a full slate coming up. So in a couple of weeks, after this comes out, we'll be headed to Mexico. We do our Riviera Maya tour down there, which is amazing, stay at the JW, go to cenotes and islands and get to make tortillas. We learned how to do that from some Mayan ladies that teach us how to do it, which is awesome. Then, after that, we have our winter ride, which we get to go to a bunch of different islands on the coast of Georgia, which is really funny. Scott Garwick I think he found out about Bragg through this podcast, yes, and then actually came on winter ride from listening to this show, which is. Thank you guys so much for sharing the word, absolutely.

Speaker 3: 9:38

Let me interrupt you just for a minute. You're one in Mexico. Where's that at in Mexico?

Speaker 4: 9:44

So we fly into Cancun and we stay two days there at the JW and we don't ride in Cancun because it's busy, but we do take a ferry over to Islaahuras, the isle of women, and we ride around there, which is awesome, and then from there we get out of the busy touristy zones and we go to the interior of the yucatan peninsula and we get to go to cenotes. We go to chichen, itza, which is the mayan pyramids, um, really nice, flat as a pancake, easy riding, lots of stops, lots of cultural experiences. Um, and then we finish things up on a little fishing village called uh puerto morelos, which is uh back on the coast. It's a beautiful resort right on the water, um, and it's really a nice, lovely week, um, very warm. When I think, where you guys are, it's going to be pretty warm too in january, if I'm not mistaken right, we are, we're heading to orlando.

Speaker 2: 10:34

So, yeah, all right, we're going to Orlando.

Speaker 4: 10:36

So yeah, all right, we're going to circle back to that. I got a question at the end in our lightning round about Orlando, but we'll come back to that.

Speaker 3: 10:43

So what other international you got, the Mexico, what else you got going Winter?

Speaker 4: 10:48

Ride, winter Ride is coming up, and then Spring Tune-Up, of course, which is lovely and awesome. You guys came down to, unfortunately. Then spring tune up, of course, um, which is lovely and awesome you guys came down to unfortunately the year we got a torrential downpour. I believe it was still had a good time.

Speaker 3: 11:01

Oh yeah, we had a great time, yeah yeah, it's a great outdoor festival environment.

Speaker 4: 11:05

Everybody camps. It's one of the best weekends in cycling, for sure um, that's where we got to meet heather oh, that's true. Yeah, the whole family comes down for that. Actually, my daughter just joined Girl Scout, so she's going to be hawking her Girl Scout cookies there this year.

Speaker 4: 11:20

Oh very nice. I'm excited to see how many people buy those. We'll see. And then, after Spring Tune-Up we are headed to. We're going to go scout our Croatia trip, so Heather and I are going over there to scout all of our Croatia. We're going to go scout our Croatia trip, so Heather and I are going over there to scout all of our Croatia. We'll be riding around there and then we have Big Brag, of course, which you guys will be at, and you're all for those of you not on YouTube and those listening we are all coincidentally wearing the very same Brag blue cap. Maybe you guys planned it, but I certainly did not.

Speaker 3: 11:51

We didn't talk to each other about it at all, I just did that we didn't talk to each other about it at all. I just did that and I'm wearing your wonderful hee-haw jersey, as I like to call it. Love this jersey. So yeah, we're all things Bragg today.

Speaker 2: 12:02

Yeah, and I got your handlebar Bragg t-shirt on today, so I actually bought that at the Big Red Tent and at the time I went back to my my own quarters, you know and we did indoor camping and I, I put it on. I'm like Ooh, not good, but now I'm the 2.0. It fits great.

Speaker 4: 12:24

That's how everyone buys clothes, right? Hopeful, hopeful buying. So I like to call that.

Speaker 4: 12:33

That's right. I do that with jeans all too often, yeah, so then, after, after we do that, then we're got. We got two weeks of our rides in the Loire Valley. Um, so we're taking two sold out weeks over there and we're riding, uh, from vineyard to vineyard, um, from castle to castle, seeing how the French royalty lived it up, and then we're staying. You know, we're dining at, you know, really nice French restaurants every night, which is going to be a lot, but it's also going to be delicious. Um, so super excited for that. Um, and then, yeah, and then, and the end of the summer, we're doing our Bruges to Amsterdam trip. Again got two sold out boats of that again, which is awesome, um, and all these videos are on YouTube, so they have great recaps on there If anybody wants to live vicariously through the brag team. Um, yeah, and then we started all over again awesome.

Speaker 2: 13:20

Well, I mean, I just wanted to make sure you, of course, I know that many are tuning in here today to hear the breakdown of the route for big brag um and, if I might correct, I think I saw it's 45th um uh route. Is that correct? That is right. This saw it's 45th route. Is that correct? That is right. This will be our 45th year. Okay, but I definitely wanted to talk about others. Like you said, scott Garwick. I mean, we had him on and he's a monthly subscriber and we appreciate him and a very big supporter of ours and his interview was just awesome and Michael and I were both very inspired after interviewing him. So, scott, it's not too late. Buddy, you got until midnight you got until midnight.

Speaker 2: 14:02

You can save 50 bucks, I mean so just to be clear. You're going to pretty soon. We're going to break down the route. I just want to make sure I get this out there. If they're listening today, on January 1st, they have until midnight to save $50. You're going to sign up anyway. Just sign up. And when you do, there's a team name there Put Cycling Men of Leisure. So type that in there, stop listening.

Speaker 3: 14:28

That's right. Stop listening right now. Go over to that website, register and then come back to us. Absolutely, we don't mind.

Speaker 2: 14:36

Yeah, we'd love to have you, and Franklin just said it, you heard it from the executive director himself the last two years we had the largest team. Let's make it three, so our first. By the way, I'll never forget when you said I hear Cycling man of Leisure is looking for a team, I was like, yes, we are. Um, with that being said, uh, the biggest question that so far I have been getting some behind the scenes we call it our leisure community. Now, um, we, I was listening to um, the Kelsey podcast, and they're like they call their listeners the 92 percenters and I'm like we've got to come up with a name for the people who are audience, who associate with us and write us. And so our leisure community is what we came up with, and a few of them have said hey, do you got any hints on the ride? Now you do this with us, knowing that with full faith that we obviously are not spreading the word.

Speaker 2: 15:37

So I apologize to everybody. You are hearing it now, today. So Happy New Year and enjoy this. But biggest question that I have got is is it actually going across the state this year? So how do you want to release this? How do you want to tell where we're state this year. So where? How do you want to release this? How do you want to tell where we're going this year? I've got some notes here.

Speaker 4: 16:10

So the more and more I listen to you guys' show, it's become a trivia show almost, with the listener spotlight. Listener spotlight.

Speaker 2: 16:24

There we go. I got some toys here.

Speaker 4: 16:26

I thought I would turn the tables mainly on Michael, as he is always the trivia man. History aficionado. Were you a history major, michael.

Speaker 3: 16:39

I was yes. Okay, I didn't major though in Georgia history. So let's just put that out there right now.

Speaker 2: 16:47

He's a major something.

Speaker 4: 16:51

And then your job used to be in radio as well. You used to do trivia on the radio.

Speaker 3: 16:55

That's right. Yeah, back in my radio days.

Speaker 4: 16:58

Okay, so this is going to. I don't know. This may be a dream for you, it may be a nightmare, I don't know. So is you know?

Speaker 3: 17:02

going to?

Speaker 4: 17:03

I don't know this may be a dream for you, it may be a nightmare, I don't know. So I figured you guys are going to need a map, because you're probably not. You guys obviously don't live in Georgia. We do not. You may need a map, google maps, your computer, whatever you need. I'm going to give you some hints. I got three hints for each town.

Speaker 4: 17:17

I like this and we'll we'll give you some guesses and see how close you can get, and then we have some highlights for each town as well. I love it All right. So the first town geography is easy, right. It's located at the confluence of two rivers. That flow forms another river, obviously, and flow into the Gulf of Mexico.

Speaker 3: 17:40

Wow, so you're looking for a town at the confluence of two rivers?

Speaker 2: 17:48

that flow into the Gulf. That's right. So, ed, this is where your 1.6 listening is going to come into play, and you're really going to be drinking your 1.6 listening, but in the meantime, I'm going to the Gulf of Mexico.

Speaker 3: 18:02

I would say and I don't know if this is right, this is just LaGrange.

Speaker 4: 18:07

There is some rivers in LaGrange and a lake that flow, I guess the Chattanooga flow.

Speaker 3: 18:11

That's not it, huh.

Speaker 4: 18:12

But it's not LaGrange. No, there's also a number of hills in this town, seven hills in fact, that are in this town.

Speaker 3: 18:21

Oh, adam do you have any guesses?

Speaker 4: 18:25

Okay, so our second clue for our first town is there are many hills in this town. Some might say there's seven hills in this town.

Speaker 2: 18:34

Ooh.

Speaker 4: 18:36

Seven hills, huh, seven hills. I thought that would be a dead giveaway for a history major, but I could be wrong. Could it be Rome? Rome, it is. All roads lead. Here was your last clue. There we go. Did you get that just from the Seven Hills or were you actually looking at the map?

Speaker 3: 18:59

The Seven Hills is what I was like is there Rome? There is a Rome, yeah so. Seven Hills, yeah, give like. Is there Rome? There is a Rome, yeah so there is Seven. Hills yeah, give it away.

Speaker 4: 19:06

So Rome, georgia Rome is very close to the Western border, so it is going to go across the state in fact, so we'll get to the last state where we end later. So Adam, you'll be happy about that, but yeah, so Rome. They had a drawing actually to determine the name for the city and the guy that won the drawing made a bunch of parallels to Rome and they named the city Rome. So it's really cool. And the other info that I have for each town is if there's a distillery or a brewery in there or a brewery in there, because I know you guys have rented cars on our rides in the past to visit close by and local distilleries, so there are a few towns.

Speaker 4: 19:51

There are a few towns with distilleries. There's actually no distillery here, but there is a few breweries. There's River Remedy Brewing, Rome City Brewing, and then there's also I know you're a cigar aficionado as well, so they have Hotel DeRicci, which is an old Havana cigar bar right downtown.

Speaker 2: 20:11

Man, I mean a brewery, a cigar bar and the kicking off of Big Brag 2025. So you're going to be happy about that.

Speaker 4: 20:23

I love it. Rome's also cool. They actually have the world's largest contiguous college campus there. It's called Berry College and a cool thing they have there. It's 27,000 acres, this college campus, so it's ginormous, wow. And they actually have bald eagles there and they have an eagle cam that multiple different webcams on different Eagles nests around the campus so you can log on anytime and check out the bald eagles there on Berry College, which is really cool. So if you want to get there early, you can.

Speaker 4: 20:52

They've got a nice heritage trail system that that goes along some of those rivers that we're talking about the confluence of the Anstatula and the Etowah River which turn into the Cusa so you can ride along those, get a nice little warmup and the downtown area is really awesome. Everything's going to be really nice and compact there. We're going to be staying basically downtown at the Forum River Center, so it's a really cool starting point and Rome has a really cool downtown, so definitely worth getting in town a little bit earlier. If you're getting a hotel, you know, come stay the night before and and get acquainted with Rome Cool, all right. So the next day we're doing a day one. We're doing 49 miles, 2,900 feet of elevation, um, and we are going to ride some of these to be a really famous ride in Rome, uh, called up the Creek without a pedal. Um, so that's a really cool ride. We're going to be a really famous ride in Rome called Up the Creek Without a Pedal, so that's a really cool ride. We're going to do a lot of the routes that they used to do, so it's really pretty.

Speaker 4: 21:49

And then we're going to get into our next town, which was the first town to have a historic mural Coca-Cola mural painted on the outside of one of their walls, on the pharmacy in one of the towns. So I know you travel across. You guys travel a lot. You see Coca-Cola murals. You know all over the place. I'm sure they are prolific here in Georgia and this town was the first one to have one of those. I don't know if you guys are looking at your map, but it's my may or may not be related to Coca-Cola. All right, they also have a Tyrannosaurus Rex in this town. And then the last one it has, in fact, a brewery that, if you combine the brewery with all their other brewing locations, is the largest brewery in the world.

Speaker 3: 22:47

Now see, my first guess here would be Atlanta, because they used to have the T-Rex thing or the big dinosaur, in the airport.

Speaker 4: 22:56

You're looking at your map, it's the home of Coca-Cola.

Speaker 3: 22:59

Exactly, it doesn't work out strategically with the map.

Speaker 2: 23:04

I'm going with Cartersville or Eckworth or Altoona or Oak Grove.

Speaker 4: 23:12

Cartersville. First guess is usually correct. Ok, so Cartersville, another really cool town, anheuser-busch. They actually have a plant there and they have a beautiful back road century that leaves out of that uh plant every September. Uh, we're going to be riding a lot of their routes as well. Um, and that is a very beautiful century. If you're, you know, if you're from Georgia or close to Georgia, definitely recommend coming to to ride there. It starts at the blood bud plant, excuse me, and you get to talk to some of the people that that make Bud Light and Budweiser there, which is you know. I know they were embroiled in controversy recently and I know a lot of people. I've actually heard you guys give Bud Light some some trash talk on here before, or maybe no, it was Natty Light. I'm sorry. Natty Light, oh yeah.

Speaker 4: 24:03

It was Natty Light. Yeah, that was Armando right, didn't he get hit with a Natty Light? Yes, he got hit with a Natty Light.

Speaker 3: 24:06

And if that's the beer, almost a full can.

Speaker 4: 24:08

So you know not a bad one to throw out the window. If you're going to throw one out the window, yeah, yeah, uh. But actually, scientists like the, their ability to pump out I forgot how many hundreds of thousands of cans per day, consistently, day after day, and have it taste the same whether you open it up in kansas city or atlanta, georgia, is just um, they're scientists. How they make it work, it's crazy, um, anyway. So anhyzer bush is there, um also.

Speaker 4: 24:40

And on our brewery distillery, in addition to Anheuser-Busch downtown, they have the Drowned Valley Brewing Company and fun fact, fun note we're actually going to have a rest stop at the Drowned Valley River outpost on the Etowah River on that first day of riding. So rest stop two first day is going to be actually at one of their breweries Really cool Right by a covered bridge, right on the river. They're going to have some music playing there. I think we're going to have some bagels from the number one bagel bakery in Georgia, which is going to be really cool. So that'll be a really cool stop, and legally they can't serve until a little bit later in the day. So, definitely, if you take your time getting there, though, you're going to hit it and be able to try some of the uh Drown Valley Brewing Brewing Company's beer.

Speaker 3: 25:28

Oh we're we're men of leisure, we take our time, so that should not be an issue.

Speaker 4: 25:32

So you'll be you'll be right on time, uh, and then, actually, we're going to ride straight through downtown Cartersville, um, and Cartersville probably has one of the most vibrant downtowns of all the ones that we're going to pass through this year. So we're going to have a rest stop right in the middle of downtown, which is really cool. There's tons of awesome restaurants, breweries, all kinds of fun stuff to do in downtown Cartersville. Our route's going to take us right through there on the way to Georgia Highlands, where we're going to stay that night at a college. So lots of cool stuff to do in Cartersville. I mentioned that T-Rex, there is a tele-science museum, which is really cool. If you want to check it out, you can actually walk to the Savoy Automobile Museum. They've got hundreds of cars walking distance from our overnight site. So there is a ton of cool stuff to do when we're in Cartersville. Cool, that's awesome, man, and this is a picture of you riding that you're you're putting up here now, adam right, oh yeah, of course yeah, on my new bike yeah without the debrem love

Speaker 2: 26:41

it sorry, I had to beep him.

Speaker 4: 26:45

That's fine all right and the next, next day we're going to do 44 miles, 2,800 feet of elevation Might be a little bit more than that and on one of the most beautiful roads I think we're going to ride on all week. So that is again following some of that beautiful back road century route Really beautiful Into our next town, which is the marble capital of Georgia, which is the marble capital of Georgia. Marble mined from here has been on structures like the Lincoln Memorial.

Speaker 2: 27:20

New York Stock Exchange and the US Capitol.

Speaker 4: 27:24

Hmm, oh, no help. The starting point or terminus, depending on if you're going northbound or southbound of the Appalachian Trail, was originally located in this town.

Speaker 3: 27:40

The starting point. So the starting point or the ending point?

Speaker 4: 27:49

Depending on if you're hiking north or south. Yeah, okay, looking at the map. Original original, not anymore original.

Speaker 3: 28:02

Yeah, for all you hiking history buffs was that jasper.

Speaker 4: 28:08

It is jasper. See, I'm not even getting through all my clues here. You're killing me, sorry. No, it's good, it's good, you know it's. Uh, I'm making them too easy is what it is, but I didn't. Yeah, there you go. I should have known I was going against the history buff, so, of course, uh. So, yeah, jasper, and we went through jasper, uh, 2018.

Speaker 4: 28:25

So we'll be going back there this year and actually their downtown has kind of doubled since we've been through there before. And this is our first stop which actually has a distillery. So I will find you two and my new favorite expression that I hear on your show all the time bellied up at the bar at the distillery, I'm sure. Oh, yes, they have a sharp top distilling company, so that's two local guys there. They started a distillery. They got bourbons, gins and a couple other spirits that they distill there, and Sharp Top is actually the closest mountain to Jasper. Jasper is actually known as Georgia's first mountain city, right before you get into the serious mountains of North Georgia, which we're not going to. This is more of a foothills and valleys ride, which we're debating on calling it foothills and valleys or Pedal to Piedmont, which, by the time this episode comes out, we'll have made a choice. So I don't know what do you guys think Pedal to Piedmont or foothills and valleys?

Speaker 2: 29:32

I'm just one vote and I would go Peddle the Piedmont. It's got a better ring to it.

Speaker 4: 29:34

It does, yeah it does, yeah, but I figure, no one really knows what the Piedmont is outside of Georgia, so I was trying to have a more larger appeal.

Speaker 3: 29:44

Yeah, but still keep it mysterious, you know? Yeah, peddle the Piedmont. People like a mystery.

Speaker 2: 29:49

Okay, I see the Fainting Goat Vineyards. Not that we'll be there, but it's north of Jasper.

Speaker 4: 29:55

Well, funny story about Fainting Goat Vineyards. Last time we were there in 2018, we had a rest stop. That was at Fainting Goat Vineyards, which is beautiful great vineyards, great wine, awesome place. If you're ever there, definitely go check it out. But if you're on a bicycle, however, we went over Burnt Mountain that day.

Speaker 4: 30:18

Last year we were or, excuse me, last time in 2018, our route took us over Burnt Mountain, so that was a true mountain ride for Bragg, which is a lot of people love. Some people love it less. So it's. You know it's a very big climb. You know you probably had it as like a 15 mile hill that day, and then I chose this beautiful vineyard as a rest stop, which is on the hill going over Burnt Mountain, and then you had to take a sharp turn to go a quarter mile up a even steeper hill just to get to the rest stop and then from there, ride back down to continue going up and over again. So I got so many people upset with me, um, that they had to do an extra quarter mile of climb on an already hellacious climbing day.

Speaker 2: 31:01

Well, why do you think they call it fainting goat?

Speaker 4: 31:03

that's right I mean, that was my thing. You knew it was a mountain ride. You knew what you're signing up for, that year, um, but this time, don't worry, we're going south, uh, out of Jasper, so we're not going into the mountains, we are kind of steering clear of them. But yeah, jasper is a cool place. They have that Sharp Top Distillery, they have Penley Creek Brewing Company and Talking Rock Brewery. Most of those are all walking distance from our venue, which is great, so you don't even have to shuttle. The school we're staying at is an eighth of a mile into the downtown. Tons of cool stuff to do there. They have a lot of other stuff going on in town. You can tour some quarries while you're there. There's lots of stuff to do in Jasper and it's a really cool town to hang out in.

Speaker 4: 31:50

And then the next day we're going 50 miles, 3,600 feet in elevation, to our next town, which houses a little bit of controversy in two of our towns, this time surrounding waterfalls. The first town has the tallest I'm going to put this in air quotes tallest waterfall in Georgia, at at 729 feet. So that's your first clue tallest waterfall in georgia. Um, and adam, if you've been watching our family, uh, youtube vacation getaways. We actually visited this waterfall this past summer, so is it uh, amical kalala?

Speaker 4: 32:29

kalowu Amicalola, Amicalola. Yeah, that is the waterfall. Okay, and then the city is. I don't know if you guys were ever in a NASCAR and some of our older listeners might get this, but Awesombill from Dawsonville man.

Speaker 3: 32:48

Oh, not a NASCAR guy.

Speaker 4: 32:50

Oh well.

Speaker 3: 32:50

So Dawsonville.

Speaker 4: 32:51

Yeah, awesomb, so Dawsonville. Yeah, Austinville from Dawsonville, so Dawsonville, another cool town, and we're kind of keeping with the theme of having a lot of racing and car history. That museum in Cartersville, and then here we actually have NASCAR Hall of Fame, located in Dawsonville, and where we're going to be staying is actually a Stone's Throw from there, and then in there, stone's Throw from our venue, guess what they have just for you guys A distillery, that is correct.

Speaker 2: 33:25

Oh, I love it.

Speaker 4: 33:26

Yeah, so this is an all-new distillery, granddaddy Mim's Distilling Company, which is basically connected to the the nascar hall of fame, appropriately, um, because I'm sure you, you two know, you know, moonshine and nascar go hand in hand. So, absolutely, in this town of dawsonville, uh, stock car racing actually started, um, which grew out of their history of running moonshine highway nine, which will be on, for, you know, maybe a mile this year, uh, they used to call it thunder road, uh, because they would run so much moonshine from Dawsonville down into the city of Atlanta, uh, and they would take nine as part of that. So it's called thunder road, um, and they actually there is. Uh, the community came together and, um, there's this awesome guy who built an F1 style racing track in Dawsonville, which I am diligently working on with the Chamber of Commerce to get us to be able to ride on on our layover day, which would be super awesome. That would be cool.

Speaker 4: 34:26

Yeah, so it's Atlanta Motorsports Park and it is really cool. They do races out there all the time. They actually have kart racing. So we're going to try and do that a day that we're there too. If you want to do some actual F1-style kart racing on the track. You can hopefully do that. We're trying to arrange that. And yeah, so Dawsonville is another cool town. That's actually our layover town, so we're going to try and arrange folks to go up and check out that waterfall at Amicalola, like. So go up and check out that waterfall at Amicalola, like I talked about as well, so you can actually hike up. I forgot how many stairs it is. It's hundreds of stairs to get to the top, but it's a really cool waterfall to go check out if you've never seen it. Or you guys could just hang out at the distillery the whole time, your choice.

Speaker 3: 35:06

I think we can split our time and do a little of both there you go.

Speaker 2: 35:12

Let's hope I'm not chasing down a wheel yeah.

Speaker 4: 35:16

So if you, uh, if we're in town, in dawsonville, and you hear an air raid siren, don't worry um. There's a guy who, uh, owns the historic dawsonville pool room, which is really famous, um, because it's the elliot family. Bill elliot um aust Austin. Bill, from Dawsonville, is Bill Elliott, and his son, chase Elliott, is also NASCAR legend. He actually won the sprint cup in 2020. So another champion racer. So every time an Elliott family member wins a NASCAR race, he just rings this air raid siren for an exorbitantly long time in town. I don't think there's a race while we're in town, but cause it's not a Sunday, of course, but a really cool place historic place to go check out.

Speaker 2: 35:56

is that Dawsonville Pool Room as well? I see that the Checkered Flag Catering is right next to Dawson Pool Room. Traditional American food there's all kinds of stuff there.

Speaker 4: 36:06

Yeah, there's all kinds. It's a smaller downtown. It's one of the smaller downtowns we'll be in, but also lots of stuff in the surrounding community that we can get into, so it'll be a really cool stop and we're going to stay right in the middle of downtown, which will be really fun, cool, all right. Next day we are going 54 miles, 3,700 feet of elevation, to a town, to a town and get out your history degree, michael where President Martin Van Buren's cousin settled here in 1800 and built a lot of the houses in town.

Speaker 4: 36:43

Ooh, yeah, that's no help Named after John Clark, a Revolutionary War general and the 31st Governor of Georgia. So Clarksville, clarksville it is, and I believe you guys stayed there not last year, a year before last, yeah, and that was when you were saying, when the kids were hanging out at the pool and you couldn't take it anymore. That day, I believe right.

Speaker 2: 37:14

I think so yeah, I don't remember that day. Must have been a tough day. Yeah well, he doesn't remember lots of things. Yeah, you know, he calls Mark Matt, matt Mark.

Speaker 3: 37:29

He's got the M right, Come on.

Speaker 4: 37:31

Yeah, y'all messed it up so many times on purpose. Now I'm not sure what it really is.

Speaker 2: 37:38

It's Mark, it's.

Speaker 4: 37:40

Mark. All right, clarksville cool town. Clarksville Downtown's fun. You guys have been there. No distillery, but they do have the copper pot, the attic and the community brew and tap. So tons of fun stuff downtown to do there. Plus, where we're staying has a pool which is really nice. After a long day's ride you can hop in the pool, which is really cool. Then we're going to head 57 miles, 3,300 feet of elevation, to the next town. And funny story I went to a camp with the son-in-law of the world's strongest man, who is from this town. He lifted a total of 6,270 pounds on a backlift which is listed as the Guinness Book of World Records greatest weight ever lifted by a human.

Speaker 2: 38:30

Wow Okay, yep, michael, that doesn't that doesn't help, the uh.

Speaker 4: 38:38

The town is named uh after the Cherokee word for beautiful. So if you know Cherokee, I'm not sure if you studied that in your history class Toka, Wow, how did you know that Cherokee word I mean? How did you know Tok? Cherokee word I mean, how did you know toka meant beautiful? Well, don't we all know Cherokee? I guess not.

Speaker 3: 38:57

I went to college out in Nebraska where they literally Native American and several of the Native American languages are in fact a, a class you can take for your foreign foreign language requirement oh, wow, that's.

Speaker 4: 39:10

That's crazy and interesting. So you know some Cherokee that's going to come in our last town as well. So the Cherokee word for beautiful toko. What town are we going to?

Speaker 2: 39:22

looking at your map, To finish it off, you mean no, no, no.

Speaker 4: 39:33

This is our second to last town, oh. And this is also where our waterfall controversy comes in, because when you go there and you tell them that their waterfall is tall, but not the tallest, they disagree. Oh. Because, it's actually. They have. The tallest free-falling waterfall east of the Mississippi is in this town at 186 feet, so that's going to be Henderson Falls.

Speaker 3: 39:57

Nope, no Okay, because I'm looking at the map now. I found Toca here and okay, they had Henderson Falls Park.

Speaker 4: 40:06

So Toccoa is the town. Toccoa toka was okay. Yeah, yes, okay, there we go, all right. So, yeah, that's our waterfall controversy. Um, both towns love to claim they have the tallest waterfall, so I'm not sure if you want to count a cascading waterfall as a waterfall or if it has to be free falling. But um dawsonville has the tallest at 729 feet, and then, uh you know is funny.

Speaker 3: 40:34

We've had this dispute before because when we were in Michigan they talked about a waterfall and we stopped on the ride to look at the waterfall and it was just. It was a long kind of cascading thing and we were kind of disappointed. I'll just leave it at that. It was like, well, water is falling, but I mean it's only falling you.

Speaker 4: 40:56

Water is falling, but it's only falling. We've discussed this before. They're both very impressive. You'll have to look at both and see what you think. Toccoa it is truly 186 feet of free-falling waterfall, which is really cool. If you ever catch it when it's flood stage or raining, they won't let you there at flood stage. It's really cool to check out. It's actually on the campus of Toccoa Falls College, so our route doesn't take us right by there, but it's not far from where we're staying and you can go down there and check it out. It's a really cool waterfall to check out and they do have. They have Curahee Winery and Vineyards and they have Wesley's on Doyle downstairs. So no distillery, but they do have a couple of really cool bars and vineyards there that you can check out. There's also the Curahee Military Museum, which is right downtown you can check out. That's 15,000 square foot of World War II museum memorabilia. So, michael, I'm sure you'll definitely have an interest in that.

Speaker 3: 41:53

Oh, absolutely.

Speaker 4: 41:54

Yeah, toccoa is a really cool town. It's funny. I went to camp, uh, the director of the camp while I was there. His name is Ed Schaefer Um and he married um, paul Anderson's daughter, and Ed Schaefer, the guy I went to camp with it. He's taller, I'm six, three.

Speaker 4: 42:15

He's I don't know 6'4", 6'5", and he is just a grizzly bear of a man. You know just every. His fingers are, you know, huge sausages, not in a bad way, but just like. He is just a huge man, very intimidating. And he said that when he asked for his daughter's hand in marriage from Paul Anderson, the strongest man in the world, he shook his hand and he grabbed his hand and said son, do you see how big my hand is? He's like, yes, sir, he's like if you ever hurt my daughter, I will crush your skull with this hand.

Speaker 4: 42:47

Wow, he could probably do it too. I mean he lifted 6,000 pounds. I mean the guy's incredible. They actually have a? Uh, they have a monument to him in takoa, um, so you can go check out the monument and see how large and strong he really is. So he was a really cool, really cool guy, um, really good christian guy he had. He actually started, founded a school for, uh, troubled youth um down in south ge, south Georgia, that still runs to this day, and they actually used to do a lot with cycling, which is really cool. So anyway, lots of to-go history there, all right. And then our last day. We're headed 56 miles, 2,600 feet of elevation, so probably our flattest day, and we are headed to our last town. We are headed to our last town, so it was originally carved out of two other counties in 1850 and was the only town in.

Speaker 4: 43:50

Georgia or, excuse me, only county in Georgia named after a woman.

Speaker 3: 44:00

She was very fierce and was renowned during the Revolutionary War for her determination and efforts to rid the area of British sympathizers and British soldiers. Well, nobody likes the British sympathizers, so no way. Livonia.

Speaker 4: 44:12

No, but we're going to pass pretty close to there, all right. And then, two miles south of this town, was the Cherokee center of the world. Cherokee Indians assembled here. They had many trails that radiate from here in many directions. They came here to hold councils, dance, worship and where they would do all kinds of related functions, barter with their hides and all kinds of stuff. So it was the center of the Cherokee world.

Speaker 3: 44:40

So now, knowing that you're fluent in Cherokee, michael, you got to know where the Cherokee center of the world is. Well, first off, I don't think I ever said that I was fluent uh, all right, and it's center of the Cherokee world.

Speaker 4: 44:56

You got another one. Yeah, this town is named after one of the largest lakes in the southeast, with almost 90 square miles, 962 miles of shoreline and it's 56,000 acres, and it's actually a man-made reservoir.

Speaker 2: 45:12

Savannah.

Speaker 4: 45:13

Hartswell, Hartwell that's it. Hartwell, Lake Hartwell and Hartwell that's it. Lake Hartwell and Hartwell is the actual town and we ended there in 2018. It's a great little town. They do have a brewery there, Southern Heart Brewing Company, and actually two Bragg riders were original investors in this distillery or, excuse me, this brewery. So definitely a place you want to check out while you're there. And we are going to end right on the lake at Long Point, and it's a beautiful you know, you got you know over 180 degree view of the water on this peninsula. We're going to be set up right there. End of the road party is going to be there. We'll have the Bragg bar. We'll have a meal for everybody. Most people jump in the water to celebrate ending the ride right there on the water. It's just a great spot to end.

Speaker 2: 46:18

Awesome Looking at Anderson, which is next to Hartwell.

Speaker 4: 46:26

Anderson is in South Carolina. That's the closest regional Airport. Right, yeah, I see your logistics.

Speaker 3: 46:32

The planner's already going, isn't he?

Speaker 2: 46:35

Oh yeah, oh yeah. Listen, I mean we haven't even begun to. I mean, now we know. Obviously, if you watch the video at midnight, I hope you came here first personally. But Rome, georgia, Cartersville, jasper, dawsonville for the overnight, clarksville, toccoa and Hartwell I was kind of quiet during that because I am not the history major, I am the can chat GBT give me the answer kind of guy. Michael is the history guy. But looking at this I'm excited. I mean I've been to Clarksville, but the rest of it I don't think we've been to before.

Speaker 3: 47:18

No, and where's the overnight town or the Dawsonville? Not the overnight town, dawsonville, so that's the overnight town or the Dawsonville. Not the overnight town Dawsonville, so that's the okay.

Speaker 2: 47:28

Oh yeah, I am. The planner is the wheels are turning and spinning.

Speaker 4: 47:33

Yeah, so if you are a guest and you're coming from afar, there's shuttles easily from Rome to the Atlanta airport and airport Um, and it's about a two hour drive from Atlanta airport to Rome and same it's about two hours from the Atlanta airport to Hartwell Um. But also you you know, if you're going to do regional, which is obviously more expensive, but Augusta is pretty easy to get to Hartwell Um and yeah, then Atlanta would be your closest.

Speaker 2: 48:02

So if you're flying from afar, atlanta is definitely your best, your best bet okay, okay, um which is why I emailed stephanie earlier upon registration is if I had to make a change. Uh, because I I already paid for the end town to the start town bus, but might have to make a change, mr Sharp.

Speaker 2: 48:25

Yeah, we could fly to Atlanta and go out from there. That's right. So we always advertise to do brag how you want to do brag, you and I will put a plan together. There's about 85 flights from Detroit to Atlanta a day. I can pick.

Speaker 3: 48:44

Anytime I want to go any place from Kansas city on Delta anywhere else. I'm coming to Atlanta, so it works out beautifully.

Speaker 2: 48:53

There you go. Last year for brag you came into Detroit. That word, that was pretty cool.

Speaker 3: 48:57

That was a one-off. That's never happened before or since.

Speaker 2: 49:00

But yeah, it was kind of cool. He, he was coming in and I, I got to the airport early and went up to the sky club and then he got off one plane, we hopped on another and the adventure began. So, um, well, I I appreciate you having it uh trivia style and and taking the uh effort to give us some breweries and distilleries. I mean, a lot of people tuned in last year and ended up signing up because they heard, heard you talk about certain aspects of the ride, things that are going to be there. Knowing you, you probably still have some things in the works. You had concerts before which were amazing. Last year, in the overnight or no, the night before the overnight, that gentleman who played was just amazing. I don't know, I forget his name and I feel awful, but uh, he was. Um, you had the park across from all the restaurants and you, you, uh, you had a bunch of concerts that night.

Speaker 4: 49:58

Yeah, yeah, we do. I pride myself on. I used to do beer and music festivals before taking over Bragg, so I pride myself in finding some good musical acts, especially Spring Tune-Up, big Bragg. A lot of the towns choose entertainment, but on Spring Tune-Up we can pick them pretty good. I have a few more questions for you guys, just being an avid fan of the show and listening so much. Okay, the first of which, which I'm still. I know a few of these other people in my life, but would you call yourself a Disney adult? What's with Disney?

Speaker 2: 50:36

No.

Speaker 4: 50:36

You love Disney. Every episode there's a Disney thing.

Speaker 3: 50:40

Tell me about Disney First off. Let me stop you right there. First off, you're talking with adam true, true story using the term adult with adam is kind of pushing the terminology, the definition I don't know why I put.

Speaker 2: 50:56

I mean, there are so many ai features I could put up with someone who's on time, someone's in the same time zone, I don't have to wait for it, I'm just kidding. Great question, by the way, great question. The reason why I think it's a great question is because this classification of Disney adult is like a way eccentric person who, if you haven't, if you're not sure what he's asking, this is a person who's like, oh my gosh, a Mickey Mouse and oh my god, I gotta go be a Mickey Mouse and oh, I have to buy everything that they come up with and everything.

Speaker 4: 51:36

Check.

Speaker 2: 51:37

That would be, Check.

Speaker 3: 51:40

Keep going.

Speaker 2: 51:40

Dude, if you want to buy it, go ahead. I mean no, no, I'm checking off for you.

Speaker 3: 51:44

It's like we're batting 100 so far you see the wall behind me?

Speaker 2: 51:48

if you're watching on youtube, do you see the wall behind me? That doesn't come, you know. But uh, uh, no, I, we enjoy it. So my wife and I have a time share there because it's a nice place to go on vacation and and, uh, for us it's a two-hour plane ride and it's warm and it's clean, although, although Disney's kind of gone, a little expensive, but no, I would say like a Disney adult would be. I mean, I see them when I'm there and they're like dressed for it Do?

Speaker 3: 52:16

they know your name.

Speaker 2: 52:19

I mean I'm on the mailing list. I think you are a Disney adult. Who's going there next? Michael?

Speaker 3: 52:30

I am taking my family to Disney World for New Year's Eve. My family and I are going, so I'm doing it for them.

Speaker 4: 52:41

There's all the reasons you mentioned. It's clean, it's a close flight Time share that describes the entire coast of Florida. True, and you got the beach in their place.

Speaker 3: 52:55

You don't have Mickey Mouse everywhere in Florida.

Speaker 4: 52:57

So I guess, what is it about Disney that you, because this comes up every episode. So I just want to get it out there for all the listeners as to why Disney is so magical.

Speaker 3: 53:09

Now I'm going to let me just throw this out here before you answer. From my perspective, knowing this man for many, many years good personal friend, love the guy. I'm going to say it's based upon your childhood. You had a great experience there during your childhood, am I wrong? No, you're right, you had a great experience there as a child and it's one of those things that you just keep going back to because you continue to. You're able to relive that great experience each time you go.

Speaker 2: 53:38

Yeah, and Disney World is so large that I mean you can't do it all every time. And Disney World is so large that I mean you can't do it all every time. And this time we went there for Thanksgiving because my parents were in Spain and so we were like, oh, let's just get out of town for a little bit, and for us it's easy to book a flight and then go down. And, yeah, this time we did all kinds of different things that we've never done. So there's so much to do there that, um, you know. But yeah, like wednesday and thursday were great, friday and saturday I'm get me out of there, I'm too spoiled to go, and when, when? There's not a lot of people.

Speaker 4: 54:14

so um, but uh, so we went, yeah we went 2020, october 2020.

Speaker 4: 54:21

So this was like fear. You know stuff was starting to open back up, but you know you had to wear a mask. There were, you know there was no characters, but we went. Heather was pregnant with Trey, so it was just Harper. Harper was, I guess, three years old. We rode every ride as many times as we wanted to Like, we got off the ride and, you know, like Harper, do you want to ride it again? And we'd walk right back around to the front. There was no line whatsoever, and so for me it would be hard to go back if it wasn't a pandemic, because I know I've heard horror stories of the lines and the heat and the waiting, but I don't know. I just wanted to get a take on Disney.

Speaker 3: 54:59

See, that's the beautiful thing about having a timeshare there, because I have one as well, thanks to Adam. That's the beautiful thing, because you go so often we go about every other year that you don't feel obligated to like we've got to do everything, yeah, and it's like, man, we got to do it all. You know, we got to do park every day and we got to hit it. So, by this, going every other year or so allows you to like okay, if we don't get it down, we'll get it next time.

Speaker 2: 55:31

I think there's also there's like experiences that, like you don't know about until you like been there a lot. And let me give you an example Like, like, for us, we don't have to go to the rides every time. We there's so many things that you can do there and and you know, disney does it on purpose. It's marketing, marketing, marketing, they, they, they have certain experiences that only certain people find out about. And then, if you find out about it, you're like, well, I want to experience that. And then, um, and then you go to some private event and now what they've done is they've unfortunately done what they always do when they had evenings at Magic Kingdom where it was supposed to be more intimate and only a few people there, well then they sold that out.

Speaker 2: 56:21

And then Mickey's, Notkey's, not so scary parties, and and and christmas parties, and then in the old days those were like limited so you could hop on all kinds of rides, and now they sell that. It's just like basically having two admissions in one day. So having having the experience of knowing, like, when to get in and when to get out, I think is is is good for for us. Um, we like and we like the, uh, just the atmosphere, and and then you know, there's so many different restaurants and we have certain foods that we like to go back and forth for, and so, uh, I think, I think having the knowledge is definitely great.

Speaker 2: 56:55

Now, what I do see is families that go there like the one time and they've saved up, you know, for that one because they I mean disney's made it unaffordable for for the average family. You can't, you can't, I don't think you can. I mean having the timeshare, you can go back multiple times. But can you imagine, michael, if you loaded up your family and and paid the hotel price every, every year, every other year?

Speaker 3: 57:17

I did that one, uh, maybe two times, uh, oh yeah, and with the timeshare it it makes it super. We wouldn't be going as many times as we're going if it wasn't for the timeshare.

Speaker 4: 57:28

But they got you with the timeshare.

Speaker 3: 57:30

Yeah Well but you know, it's like last time we went to six months ago, we went to what's the beach resort? Vero beach, Vero beach. We went to Vero beach instead of going to the theme park. So we were on the Atlantic side of Florida at Vero beach and we, you know, they've got a beach resort so we could just like hang out at the beach for a week.

Speaker 2: 57:51

So yeah, we've traded our time share for cruises, disney cruises, and you can do adventures by Disney and you can do, you can trade it for. You used to be able to trade it for RCI, where you could go anywhere in the world and so having the time to share. Ironically, I don't know if I've ever shared this on this show before or not, but I'm willing to share it with you. I did the whole dime tour to get Fast Passes and she gave me the materials and I took it home and I used to have a photography business for 20 years where my studio used to be my photography uh, development room and everything. And I laid all the stuff here on the shelf for a while and, like two years later, I'm like you know what I'm thinking about, going back to Disney. So I got out the paperwork and looked and I called them up and I actually bought it, and over the phone and she's like, oh, I remember you, you're the phone. And she's like, oh, I remember you, you're the photographer. Yada, yada, yada. I'm sure she took notes. I mean, they see so many people. I'm sure she's like, oh, yeah, you know, it doesn't hurt that my email address has the word photography in it. So then I ended up buying it and then it's a point-based system.

Speaker 2: 59:00

So if you go certain times of the year, like when you're talking about hot and miserable, I try to stay clear of that place when it's hot and miserable. Now don't get me wrong. I mean it happens at times, but we love going down in February, october, usually cycling season is upon us and I don't go. And then as soon as cycling season is over, then I usually say usually they have a ride here called tour to Livingston, and I live in Livingston County, and so after that, and then we usually go down for a while and it's kind of like the end of the season thing. So, uh, people are back in school and I like to go when I can, when there's lower amount of people.

Speaker 2: 59:36

So, uh, and my wife is also a big universal fan. She loves Harry Potter and, um, she doesn't listen to the show. So I'll call her a nut job, but, um, she might be a universal adult, um, but um, now if she hears that I'll be surprised because she doesn't listen. So I'll say, hey, did you hear the last show? She's like, no, I didn't hear it. I'm like, okay, well, good, so don't worry about that new bike I bought.

Speaker 2: 59:58

But um but so I, I actually would differentiate. I would say maybe I would be borderline Disney adult, but I don't think I'm. I've seen some people over there that you just go, wow, okay, but you realize your perception is always different than everybody else's perception.

Speaker 2: 1:00:21

Oh, my coworkers, you know they all make fun of me. They're all like you're going to disney again and I'm like, yeah, but then on the opposite of that spectrum uh, I've made it very obvious I live in the cold state. As a matter of fact, it's my computer says it is for 13 degrees outside. So, uh, I'm gonna go to the detroit airport, hop in a plane for a couple hours, go somewhere warm, play some golf and come back and so they can make fun of all they want, and that is the other thing, which is what we're doing in.

Speaker 2: 1:00:50

January yeah, they do have nice. Yes, they do. Yeah, and we're not going to the parks when you and I go, so so we're going to take the podcasting equipment, I'll podcast golf bourbon.

Speaker 3: 1:01:04

That's what we're doing for the long weekend.

Speaker 2: 1:01:06

I'm sure there are two in there as well. All right.

Speaker 4: 1:01:09

Well, on our winter ride, stepping back, there was a guy who came on us to Rag Rye with us and he wrote an article for Golf Digest because he rode all of Rag Rye Every day. He rode and then he would come back, drop his stuff off and then he had his clubs and he would play and walk 18 holes every day after rag rye, which I thought was just dedication beyond belief yeah, that's definitely dedication.

Speaker 2: 1:01:39

I mean, I can remember my first rag rye in 2016 there was no golfing happening.

Speaker 3: 1:01:46

We did stay on a golf course, though that one night, so you could have.

Speaker 2: 1:01:51

Where that lady with the horses.

Speaker 3: 1:01:52

Oh yeah, she thought we were going to steal her horses.

Speaker 2: 1:01:54

Oh boy, great question. The Disney question. Great question, another question.

Speaker 4: 1:02:01

Michael seems to be having a difficult time coping with the amount of sound effects and visual effects, so I just wondered how that's going, how you're dealing with it, michael. I know it's changed the dynamic of the podcast.

Speaker 3: 1:02:15

Isn't everybody who's listening to this podcast getting tired of all the crazy sound effects and the bleeps? Like I said, you're dealing with Adam and using the term adult is very difficult. It and like I said, you're dealing with adam and using the term adult is very difficult. It's like a 12 year old on a noise machine. He's just pushing.

Speaker 4: 1:02:29

See, they've been, he's just pushing pushing buttons, mostly absent so far, but until then you get him going, you know yeah, and then he just starts pushing buttons and we got sound effects and and all sorts of stuff.

Speaker 3: 1:02:42

But uh, no, uh, you, adam's a techie, and I realize Adam's a techie. I appreciate that because I'm not a techie, so he can do the technological stuff. But you know, if that keeps Adam happy, pushing the sound effects and stuff, I will go along with it. Fair. Now if he puts his Debrim on and starts pushing the buttons, I have to draw the line there. But you know I have children. I understand that. You know you pick your battles. Sometimes you let them just you know, fine, play with your little noise things and all that kind of stuff. It keeps them happy. And we can go on afterwards. Wow.

Speaker 2: 1:03:22

Wow. Well, you know what uh, the amount that you get older and the amount of stuff that bothers you gives a lot less. So, uh, listen, I've actually uh received all kinds of compliments behind the scene or something.

Speaker 3: 1:03:40

I haven't heard you read any of those compliments on the show well, franklin listens to the show. He I'm sure there's some like listener spotlight I mean, yeah, but it's all the other, the beeping, and, oh my god, at christmas we had the dancing santa forever and the noises. And what are you talking about? Exactly, exactly, thank you.

Speaker 4: 1:04:02

I just came here to stir the pot, that's all right. Thanks, Franklin we appreciate it, well done.

Speaker 2: 1:04:08

The pot has been stirred. Yes, you know, I fully admit that they're toys and I am a techie. I mean, I can walk from my basement to the second floor of my home without touching a light switch. Things go on and off automatically, it is annoying when somebody comes into town, they're like well, how do you sleep at night? Just fine, Thank you very much.

Speaker 3: 1:04:32

It's always spooky. I'm in the basement when I go to his house. You walk out, lights pop on, and then it's like lights pop off and then in the middle of the night the light will pop on because a cat walked through and it.

Speaker 2: 1:04:50

He's got it set up. It's a beautiful setup. I'm no way take away from that, but it takes some getting used to that's all okay and that's all right.

Speaker 4: 1:04:53

Last question is why do you give michael such a hard time about the different time zones all the time? Oh?

Speaker 2: 1:05:01

it, it's a joke.

Speaker 3: 1:05:03

No, that's a great question. I think this is therapy. He's acting as our therapist here. I think this is something we need to get out, because you've got this hang up with Midwest. I don't understand it. Yeah, and noises and the Midwest are your two big hangups, so I think we need to maybe talk about, I don't know, your childhood or whatever it is that's caused this Should. I lay back Should.

Speaker 2: 1:05:30

I lay back.

Speaker 3: 1:05:31

Should I lay back Whatever makes you feel comfortable. Okay so why, to answer his question, why do you have a problem with the Midwest? You jealous?

Speaker 2: 1:05:41

Well, first of all, oh my gosh. No, I grew up in Illinois, I'm not jealous at all? Well, probably should be, but those who live south of i-80. Oh, oops, sorry, um um, just kidding.

Speaker 2: 1:05:54

Half of our listeners live south of i-80 I love you all I'm sorry, I apologize, it's just michael um, but uh, so do you know? Uh, you're, you're. You are a not only friend, but friend of the show. Have you heard me tell the story of why the Central Time Zone joke? Are you asking for real or do you know? Do you know why the joke started? I did. I do not know how the joke started.

Speaker 4: 1:06:17

Oh OK.

Speaker 2: 1:06:20

So now see, michael, I want you to lay back and don't interrupt me, because I'm going to give you credit. Michael had been to Michigan twice for rides and he made he made a joke and he said sometimes jokes aren't really jokes, he's really hurt. But he said, well, when are you going to come my way for a ride? And I said you know what? That's fair? That's fair. I said I'll tell you what I said. Is there a ride coming up? And he's like, oh, I do, the gorilla century. And which is, um, pittsburgh, pittsburgh, kansas, is that right? Yes, pittsburgh, kansas. And so I said, okay, well, I'll tell you what I said. Um, I don't know if it's, maybe it's Memorial day weekend, I wasn't doing anything and my wife was working midnights and I said, all right, I'll tell you what I'll. I'll come out 12 hour drive, packed up the bike, headed out there and, um, we stayed at Kansas crossing. Why?

Speaker 3: 1:07:14

I remember that, I have no idea, but it's a, it's a casino there Might be able to call it a casino, but well, yeah, cherokee, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:07:27

But well, yeah, cherokee, yeah, exactly three or four, three, oh clark. So anyways, we're doing the ride. Uh, next morning we're doing a century ride and we start out and um and uh, it's kind of a really different kind of a ride. It's not a circle, but it kind of almost like a, like a weird l cross thing, where you go back and forth to complete the century and um, halfway through, michael said you okay? And and I said yeah. I said I don't know just not feeling it today, and uh, and he's like what, like jet lag or something, and I said yeah, it's essential time and so so it started out as a joke and then then of course, I not a joke that I won't let down, and we've kind of fed into the show.

Speaker 2: 1:08:12

Now here's the funny part you mentioned Scott Garwick, so you turned us on to Scott Garwick and he wrote us and said I'd love to be on the show and he had such wonderful stories about George Floyd and getting arrested and what a great interview. So during our communications I said now, to be fair, michael has a daughter in middle school and he's got a stepson and family and he's pretty busy and so I'm usually very receptive. Transportation is a very hit-and-miss job where there's either there's no way I can touch my phone or there's like Franklin, I've taken your call during the day, so sometimes there's times where you can be on the phone, sometimes there's not. And so I was replying and I said, well, you'll have to forgive him, he's in central time. And Scott said, hey, was replying and I said, well, you'll have to forgive him, he's in central time.

Speaker 2: 1:09:06

And scott said, hey, what's wrong with central time? I'm like, oh man, so it all started as a should I lay back michael? But it all started as the joke, um, and then, uh, it's just letting the letting the joke go on. But the truth of the matter is I grew up in illinois, very southern tip of illinois. Um, my father was in the air force bouncing around and so, um, no, no desire to go back to illinois, so I'm very happy with where I live. That's where the that's probably the joke comes into play.

Speaker 3: 1:09:35

I see it's, it's, it's warmer in southern illinois.

Speaker 4: 1:09:39

There you go, saying yeah, scott's a really good guy. I've actually, um, you know, we have the snooze box, which is that mobile hotel room which you guys actually got to stay in one night, and I sure did.

Speaker 4: 1:09:49

We were having some electrical issues in there and he Scott's actually was a commercial electrician for a number of years I don't know if you guys knew that or not, so I probably had three hours on the phone back and forth with him over different things around this and finally I got him on FaceTime basically, and we figured out the issue. So he saved me thousands of dollars in electrical work and time. I was about to cut that thing open until he got me on the right track.

Speaker 2: 1:10:20

I got to give credit where credit is due, because I know he'll listen or watch I think he's a YouTube watcher more. He was the first guy who made a donation to us, and, and you know, michael and I um, you know we're lucky to have careers and and and lucky enough to do well, but you know there's a lot of expenses and and and. So at first we were, we were kind of uncomfortable asking for donations and then was like you know what I mean, every other podcast in the world asked for donations and so, uh, just a little bit.

Speaker 2: 1:10:46

And scott was the first guy, and and then scott's son wrote us and what a what a powerful family and and powerful words, and one of those days where you read a message like that and it just makes you go, hey, that's why we're doing this, that's cool and so, uh, great guy and I could see. I could see that with what he does with bikes and selling the bikes for good causes and doing what he does.

Speaker 4: 1:11:11

So he's another guy you should follow.

Speaker 2: 1:11:13

He's a recumbent rider and does all kinds of great stuff, so go ahead.

Speaker 3: 1:11:18

Now one thing I did want to say you brought up the snooze box. Mm-hmm the snooze box is coming back to big brag, correct?

Speaker 4: 1:11:24

Oh, of course, yeah, we're keeping that thing on the road as much as we can, okay.

Speaker 3: 1:11:28

And how quickly does that fill up? Cause, let me tell you, if you've not done the snooze box, we would have the honor of of being able to try it out for an evening, because somebody left early and and Franklin, let us try it out. And it's incredible.

Speaker 3: 1:11:47

Lots of lights and charging and and it was fantastic. So you've been sleeping under a water fountain. Yeah, I would have been sleeping under a water fountain. So thank you, franklin again. But uh, what, uh, how quickly does that fill out? So say, I was, I was gonna sign up for big brag. Is it already filled up or do I have time to?

Speaker 4: 1:12:02

so we've got. The way it works is if you book before, you have first right of refusal for the next year. Basically, there's five rooms in it. Those five people have the opportunity to get it first. I think only one of them who did brag it's like a bucket list is not doing it again. I think we have one room At the time of recording. I'm not sure about the time when this comes out. Snoozeboxco if you want to check out Snoozebox and book it, you can there. But yeah, the bucket list guy, yeah, a lot of people do rides as a bucket list. You know they try and do all 50 states or they try and do things. So they, you know, just come for one ride Better hurry up, they're all going out of business.

Speaker 4: 1:12:45

So yeah, scott actually had a. He was talking to me about his bucket list and he had quite a few. He was afraid to call it a bucket list. He just wanted to call it a to-do list, but he had a number of rides on there, which brings up what rides are on you guys' bucket list. If you have a list of rides you want to still go do what's on there.

Speaker 3: 1:13:07

We've got a long list.

Speaker 2: 1:13:08

Yeah, we do, and Fault Line is on there.

Speaker 3: 1:13:12

Fault Line in Missouri is on there. We've talked about Brand, which is, you know, I'm from Nebraska, I've done it before, but Adam hasn't. The bike ride across Nebraska, bike ride across Kansas, the one down in Louisiana.

Speaker 4: 1:13:25

Zydeco yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:13:30

Zydeco, yeah, zydeco uh, the finger lakes ride. I don't remember what that's called, do you?

Speaker 4: 1:13:35

remember adam on on bonton roulette some, yes, yes the one that's around the finger lakes.

Speaker 3: 1:13:39

So those are some of them that are that immediately come to my mind. I don't know if there's other ones that come to yours, adam, adam.

Speaker 2: 1:13:46

Yeah. So, michael, you can tell the friendship goes on, because obviously I'm not going to go hang myself in the garage from him teasing me about being a child.

Speaker 3: 1:13:58

Thank God, yeah.

Speaker 4: 1:14:00

Well, now he does.

Speaker 2: 1:14:03

That's right and I control the video. So good luck, buddy, come see my lawyer. Thank God I don't have a lawyer, but he, he, he. He said that I was a little presumptuous last year. I'm like we're going back to brag and he's like dude, you realize you just committed to brag.

Speaker 2: 1:14:24

But I think what happens is and this is not because you know you're on the show and you're a friend we always say that you do it right. If you come to your ride, I mean you do do it right. I mean it was started before you, I get that. But at the same time, you've either picked up and either added your flair or continued something that was working and then twisted it to make it work. And I'm talking about just basic essentials for you know, food and snacks, having the ability to get something, having the ability to go to town to get something to eat at night, having the ability not to be cooped up, not to be out in the middle of nowhere.

Speaker 2: 1:15:05

To be cooped up and not to be out in the middle of nowhere, um, uh, we did a ride this year, um, and and in Michigan I'm. I've got to be truthful and honest. We were. We were in one of the most beautiful towns, as they say, up North Michigan, and we were so far out of town. It was so sad that we were. There's all these wonderful bars that are on right, on the right, on the water and um, and not just bar, even if you just want to go to a restaurant and have a burger and some fries for riding your bike all day and we were stuck in the middle of nowhere. So my point is that you do it right, and so I got so excited last year.

Speaker 3: 1:15:54

I'm like we're going back to Bragg and then Michael goes. You realize, by doing that you've just counted us out on the other rides that we said we were going to do. And I'm like, oh sorry, yeah, you, just I'm adam gets excited. He's like, yeah, we're doing it again.

Speaker 3: 1:15:59

It's like I get that and I, you know you do do a great job and I and I think a big part of it is, you know, you always have some type of entertainment in the evening, so there's something to do. Because we've been to rides where it's like you sit around in in camp and it's like, I mean, we always have cigars and bourbon, so that's not a big deal, but everybody else just kind of sits around and you know, twiddles their thumb or whatever. And then I like the fact that you provide multiple options for camping or for you know, staying. You've got a snooze box, like we mentioned mentioned. You've got outdoor camping, like pretty much everybody offers, but you also offer indoor camping too, so you kind of cater to everybody. So it allows for you know kind of any type of rider to come show up. So I think that's great Black dog luggage.

Speaker 2: 1:16:40

I mean, you know, in the overnight town, where we historically get a hotel and we see the black dog ladies come and loading all the luggage and and we've seen riders left from hotels where they're. They're like we're supposed to leave our bags right here and the front desk knows. I mean, so you, you have a, an option for everybody, which is which I think is just huge when you're looking for a ride. So if you're catching this show and you haven't signed up for a ride and you've thought, you know, I've been looking to do a week-long ride, I truly this will be our fourth year in a row. I wouldn't sign up, for, I mean, I'll do anything twice and your staff and um, courtesy, professionalism, um, amenities, things that that are are, you know, provided, um, you know everything that you would expect to be there. You definitely do it right and, um, I think this.

Speaker 3: 1:17:40

This would be a good if you've never ridden a week long ride before. To start here, yeah, I'll be free um, there's a ton of other options and a lot of really good rides out there, but if you've never done one before, this would be the one to get your feet wet in I appreciate that and and yeah, and just understand that they're not all this.

Speaker 3: 1:17:59

I mean, everyone has its own flavor and its own flair, and the ones that I've mentioned. I've been across kansas, I've been across nebraska, I've not been to zydeco, I've not been to the, the finger lakes. I think we've also got ohio begrudgingly.

Speaker 3: 1:18:12

Uh, adam has agreed to do that one, but uh, and tennessee is another one that we want to do. So there's a lot that's on our list and everyone's going to have its flavor and its different flares and they're going to have strengths and weaknesses and stuff like that. But if you want one ride and I'm not saying this just because you're here, if you weren't here I'd be saying the same thing- I mean proof's in the pudding.

Speaker 2: 1:18:34

We've recorded it Exactly.

Speaker 3: 1:18:36

Georgia is the ride to kind of get your feet wet into those week-long rides For sure. And after that you're going to have other rides. May not have as many amenities, may not, you know, be as well organized, but this is a good one for a starter ride I mean even for things that that people are thinking about, like bus rides.

Speaker 2: 1:18:53

I mean you offer, I mean shuttle, I mean something I didn't even realize. It's just because I don't think this way, but you offer a shuttle every night to the town before. So so, um, think about that. If you would like to have your vehicle travel with you, you literally could ride, catch the bus, go get your car and bring the car with you every night, and so, um, that's, that's an option.

Speaker 2: 1:19:21

Now, michael, you and I never think about that because we, we, we always fly in and um, but then you offer shuttles from start to end and to start, and so I think that's why I think, when I say you do it right, cause you know we've done some other rides and I think that's what makes us so frustrated on those routes we're like man, they really ought to sit down with Franklin, because you know, I'm not saying it because you're here either I mean the Michigan ride that we did recently.

Speaker 3: 1:19:47

Well, this last year there was really no shuttles into town and you know I mean a couple of the towns we were close enough to be able to walk, uh, but some of them it was like, you know, it's six miles back to town or something like that, and you know who wants to get on their bike after 80 miles and riding another six miles in and six miles back and that kind of thing.

Speaker 3: 1:20:09

So it's just little things that you notice after you've been to really good organized rides. And there's a. I mean I'll say I've done Nebraska before, I haven't done it in several years, but when I did it Nebraska was very organized and they had a lot of community participation. It was kind of like I've told you this, adam, there was kind of a rag braai on a much smaller basis, because all the communities were in it and people are out on their, you know, driveways waving at you and stuff like this, and the communities really got into it. Uh, very well organized, very well supported, um. So there's other rides out there that have that, but yours just seems to really pull it all together.

Speaker 4: 1:20:47

So I appreciate that and it's good. That's why I love listening to shows, cause, like you know, we do all these things and you talk to people. But it's good to hear you guys have honest conversations with other people about different aspects of the ride that you enjoy or what you don't like or what's important, or you know what you'd like to see or what you don't like, because it's hard to get that kind of candid feedback from people you know. So that's why I really enjoy listening to the show, because oftentimes I live behind the curtain and doing things to pull everything together, obviously, but it's good to see something from the participant-facing view or the guest-facing view of what you guys really enjoy. You know something from the participant facing view or the guest facing view of what you guys really enjoy?

Speaker 3: 1:21:26

Yeah, and that's something we've always talked about, adam and I. It's like being honest. You know we, we we don't want to mislead any of the people who listen to us or things like that, and we want to be honest. So I mean we'll tell you about it. I mean there's one ride that talk about. Uh, just because not a good ride, not a safe ride, we don't even want to bring it up. There's been people come up and ask us about it. We'll tell them about it, but we don't in any way, shape or form, promote it on here from a safety standpoint. So, uh, you know we're, we're honest in our evaluation, whether you're on the show or not.

Speaker 2: 1:22:01

So, um, yeah, that that ride happens to be in central time, just to be clear.

Speaker 3: 1:22:06

So central time had nothing to do with it. My friend there, jeez we got to get together and do a ride.

Speaker 4: 1:22:14

Uh, together one day, but you know, obviously can't ride brag and when brag going on? Obviously, but yeah, we need to. Um, that would be awesome.

Speaker 3: 1:22:24

we definitely need to figure one out and do it Absolutely.

Speaker 2: 1:22:28

The other thing that you do um, um is the team atmosphere, and I think that's huge. Oh, yeah, um and. And for those of you who do not know Franklin, your um sales model is that if a team has 10 or more, uh, then you let them design a jersey and have a team, and I think that's huge. I mean not because you know sure, I mean Cycling man of Leisure obviously has done it a couple years in a row. You've been so gracious to us and we love it and it's been fun.

Speaker 2: 1:22:59

But from the aspect of other rides that we've done, there hasn't been that team atmosphere and you can see the absentee of absenteeism of it. I mean there's not that camaraderie of joining up or or having that conversation and why they may bring their own few, few guys or whatever, but that's definitely been absent and you can definitely see that. So I think that that you do that is is really cool and I think that helps out with those who Team Paparazzi, who I see every year, and you know some of the super stragglers, and Margaret and her team, and so I mean these are people we've made friends with. I have to say, cycling men and women of leisure have been the largest last couple of years. Let's make it a third, but it is. It is awesome to to see the team atmosphere.

Speaker 3: 1:23:53

I think that's great, that's a good point, cause we've had other ride directors come to us and talk to us about you know, hey, what you know? What do you think about this ride and and things that we participated in, and that is a big thing that we've came up almost in every single time we've talked about it is you need to create that team atmosphere, because that is so missing in so many rides, and so that's came up numerous in numerous discussions about.

Speaker 3: 1:24:19

we've used you as an example that creating that team environment, that team atmosphere, really drives kind of the really great feel about the ride and I can take you back to exactly where I was.

Speaker 2: 1:24:31

exactly where I was. We left Peaches to Beaches 2022 and we got to the first rest stop and I'll never forget. It was a church and it had rows of snacks inside the church and I saw these people and they all had the same jersey on and the jersey in the back had the state of georgia. Um, I now know it probably had north side hospital. I now know it probably had bragg.

Speaker 2: 1:24:56

Um, I now know that there were some requirements there, but I remember saying, oh my gosh, that's cool, where'd you guys get that? And they're like, well, franklin bought it for us. And I'm like he did, I'm like okay. And at first no one said, oh, you have to have 10 or more. Then we got to the next rest stop and there was another team I actually think the team was Franklin's Nightmare and I said how did you guys get that? And they're like, oh, if you have 10 or more, you get your own.

Speaker 2: 1:25:24

And I remember looking at Michael going wouldn't it be cool next year if we could get 10 or more? And we surpassed that. We made it to 25, and then we made it to 37, and this year we need to do more. But yes, I just want to let you know that's where, from a rider who just organically found your ride, we had seen you at Rag Bride, for those who don't know the first time that I saw the tent, the big red, the biggest marketing device that you have, I think. Um, it's a big red tent. And then I and michael and I were looking at other rides and that's how we came upon brag to begin with, so nice and that I stole it from rag bride, like the whole.

Speaker 4: 1:26:01

Uh, rag bride's big on teams. If you know, if you've never been to rag bride, done Rag Bride and I don't know how that started at Rag Bride I think it was probably more organically. But teams there, I stole a lot of things from Rag Bride. Actually, you learn from people that do well, they had all these school buses and I thought to myself, oh man, that'd be so cool. You know, these guys aren't setting up their tent every night, they're just sleeping in their school bus. And it was cool and it's painted to be. You know, that's probably extraordinarily expensive. So I went and talked to one of the teams and I was like, oh man, this your bus is so awesome. Like, oh, that's cool. What'd you pay for it? He's like I was like 2500 bucks. Okay, so like, I think the next week I bought a bus, um, so we went and we bought a bus, we painted it for brag and made it all cool and started taking teams up to rag bride.

Speaker 4: 1:26:55

And then you know, the thing I saw at rag bride that brag was kind of missing. Um, was that team atmosphere that you guys talk about all the time and I think to me the most special thing about brag is the community. Right, my mom's done brag, you know, 28 years now or something crazy, and you know she calls it summer camp for adults, where she goes and she has what she calls her brag friends, where it's people that you know she may keep up with on Facebook or whatever throughout the year, but you know that week when they're on brag, you know they ride together, they hang out together. It's like they never skip the beat, you know, in their friendship and it's her brag friends, you know, and you know they go and do fun stuff other times too, but that's where they met, that's where they have their community, that's where they come back to.

Speaker 4: 1:27:38

So I really wanted to like try to foster and deepen the connections people have and deepen that sense of community, and I thought Teams was a good way to do that. But I'm all ears if you guys have any other ways to really amplify the community aspect of it, because to me that's what's so special. I mean, anybody can put together a good ride and have a band and rest stops and shuttles and blah, blah, blah. But it's really, you know, when I walk in and I look over the crowd and I see people hanging out and talking to each other and I haven't seen you forever. What's going on? That, to me, is what. What lights me up and makes it all worth it for me is the community that we create. So I think teams is one good way we do that, and I'd love to hear any other ideas you guys have about creating that atmosphere and fostering that atmosphere.

Speaker 2: 1:28:24

Community that atmosphere and fostering that atmosphere of community. You know, I can just name some names off the top of my head, like Mike and Vic and Margaret and Mandy, and you know I mean like getting off the bus last year, I hadn't seen those people in a year and we were waiting in line to check in and Oglethorpe, and people are just coming up to us like celebrities. You know, hey, how you been, how you been, how you been. I mean there's no better way of feeling like a million bucks by seeing, you know, some of the people that you've seen before. And so I think your mom would be spot on. I mean kudos to her for saying summer camp, but that's a perfect description.

Speaker 3: 1:28:58

Kind of is.

Speaker 2: 1:29:01

Yeah, kind of is so Big Brag 2025, we're going from Rome to Cartersville, to Jasper, to Dawsonville, to Clarksville, to Toca, to Hartwell. If you're thinking about signing up, you can save 50 bucks tonight before the prices go up before midnight. I know you're listening, I know you're paying attention and so go wwwbragorg. Click on the Big Brag 2025. Sign up A little self-plug here. There's a team name there Put Cycling Men of Leisure and you'll be on our team and I interrupt for just a minute, please.

Speaker 3: 1:29:44

This year for the team are planning a a fun event in addition to the ride. This is during the ride, if everything, if we, if we're able to pull it off, we're going to have a fun little event for the team. So, uh, just if you want to have a little extra good time, put us down and we're gonna. We're planning on an extra special event for the team, so now are you guys going to do?

Speaker 4: 1:30:06

cycling women of leisure and cycling men of leisure.

Speaker 2: 1:30:10

Well, uh, this is being recorded. So I mean, uh, if you want us to edit it out later, we can. But on the that is our goal.

Speaker 2: 1:30:19

That is our goal. Yeah, I mean, um, things kind of fell apart last year where we were supposed to have nine ladies and then, uh, one of the ladies unfortunately got injured right before coming, and then Brenda Hurst decided not to come, so I think we ended up having six ladies, I believe. And so, yes, we would love to support the ladies, and you have been great to us, as well as Primal and your previous vendor for jerseys, and we've been able to do both. So, if we can, yes, we would love to have the ladies do that. But, again, if you want me to edit that out, I will, so that's up to you guys.

Speaker 3: 1:30:58

So it can be. If you're a lady and would like to join the Cycling Women of Leisure, certainly put that down Team as well. We typically represent both of them.

Speaker 2: 1:31:09

Last year which was really cool the team jersey. The difference was the men had maroon with the men's logo. And then our artist and good friend, brian Fritz BrianLeeFritzcom. He's got some great cycling portraits. If you're looking to have a portrait of your bicycle, you can actually send a picture of your bicycle to him and you get a really beautiful artist drawing. Of course, for a fee, but he designed our, our logo, and he actually, um, he helped us with the ladies logo and so we have, we have both, and we actually have two Facebook pages um, men and ladies, and and um got a lot of great, great people out there. I know Melanie's not going to join us this year Her and her husband, keith are going to do something different, but she was, uh, on the team. And then, um, you know we've got friends from Kentucky who were on the ladies team and and I'm hoping that they come back. I mean, come on, mandy, your husband just retired so you can come on.

Speaker 2: 1:32:03

You got time got time, that's right, and so, uh, and the original cycling woman, elizia annette um from oregon. We'd love to see her if she wants. I think she's doing something else this year.

Speaker 2: 1:32:14

I think she is too but you're welcome to join again. So, um, we've got you know and that community for us. Um, one of the things that was really difficult for this gentleman we met in michigan. He kept saying how is your team all over the country? And we recently sent out postcards to the team and we saw our team on a map for the first time.

Speaker 2: 1:32:35

You and I had never we had never geo plotted it before, and so the vendor that we used to send out the postcards actually, you know, had, like the Delta, delta, you know they, the plane flies here, flies here, and we got to see wherever the team was from. I mean, we're talking quebec, uh, canada, toronto, um, oregon, washington, georgia, florida, kansas, michigan.

Speaker 3: 1:33:01

I'm missing it was all over, yeah, it was cool.

Speaker 2: 1:33:04

So it was just really cool to see where the whole team from. But this guy in michigan when we rode with, he's like, well, how do you guys all get together? I'm like, well, it's easy, we go to georgia so. But yeah, that's um, that's a, it's a great, great, great group we've met and, um, you know, it's a wonderful, wonderful homecoming to come back to, so highly looking forward to it.

Speaker 4: 1:33:29

I do like Army. Michael called it an Army one time, Cycling Men of Leisure. Army or Nation, that's right. Nation Army.

Speaker 2: 1:33:36

But you guys have the community, so yeah, A little less aggressive than you know, yeah, but remember it's for women too, I mean.

Speaker 3: 1:33:45

That's right, it is.

Speaker 2: 1:33:46

We've got multiple logos here, so we definitely have all kinds of all kinds of items.

Speaker 3: 1:33:57

So I'm impressed you still have your bottle of bourbon. In fact, I think you've got two bottles of bourbon. Yeah, we do.

Speaker 4: 1:34:01

We still. I mean we did. We did some solid work. I mean it's not a. You know we're not going to try and finish a thing you know.

Speaker 3: 1:34:08

No, no, no no no. But I think you have two bottles that have our name on it.

Speaker 4: 1:34:12

I do, I'm sorry. Yes, yes, we have the. This is 2024. And then we've got 2023. In the cabinet, I also have we do another thing. We stole from Rag Rye. We don't steal everything from them, but we do still a lot. Um was their, their custom beers. So we did a custom beer 2023 and 2024. So I have two six packs of those that I'll keep forever, um, along with these, these whiskeys here.

Speaker 3: 1:34:36

So it's nice, nice to remember well just so everybody understands if they haven't been there or haven't uh, heard. What we've done is I typically go to a? Uh, a local distillery here that actually distributes all over the place they distribute in Georgia too and a couple places in Michigan and I get bottles that have like cycling men of leisure and then the date on them and I generally bring like four bottles of it with us and then one night during the week we have what we call our, our speakeasy. We get everybody together and anybody else who wants to come and we just share some, some whiskey and and have a good time listening to music and that type of thing. So that's what we're referring to when we're talking about the the cycling men of of leisure whiskey. So definitely.

Speaker 2: 1:35:25

Uh, had some people who had never had whiskey before and and they're like, well, can we just try just a little bit? And I'm like, well, you gotta try a little bit. It's part of the initiation of being on the team that's right so, uh, last year we sat up on that hill and listened to some music and we had a because of armando's spill. We had our team split from the bottom of the hill on the top of the hill.

Speaker 3: 1:35:47

That was actually the same day we interviewed you, Franklin, on site.

Speaker 4: 1:35:56

And we also interviewed John, your medic. Yeah, that was a good one.

Speaker 3: 1:35:58

Yeah, that was a great interview, talking about what he does and that type of thing during the week of brag.

Speaker 2: 1:36:06

And talk about a really neat little interview with john. He first said well, what do you guys want me to talk about? We're like, just tell us a little bit about you. And he sits down and hits the post, so to speak, like it was perfect. He was like. He was like, well, I'm not sure, but okay, let's give her a whirl. We hit record and it was like he just uh, dude, that was like perfect.

Speaker 4: 1:36:24

So he's an amazing guy. He uh, yeah, he's, he's volunteered for umpteen million years and he's got a harley that he rides, uh, up and down the route because he can kind of you can get places faster on a motorcycle than you can. He's got a big kit and, um, you know, big med kit that he carries and he's just an amazing guy, truly a wonderful human being. Um, can't, can't thank him enough for coming on the ride every year I tell you what I can give a.

Speaker 2: 1:36:53

I can give a story if you're out there and you're not sure about you know how that works. But, um, one of the things that I like is, franklin, you do give me your cell phone number and our friend, virginia, was having that medical experience and I was able to call you and you were able to call john and he was able to get there fast on his motorcycle and help her out, and so, um, that is nice to to, to have that and he was, he was there within. We heard the motorcycle right away. So, uh, that's definitely, he's definitely got a huge heart and helps out. Well, cool. Well, franklin, we really appreciate you doing this route release. If you are thinking about a ride, definitely Big Brag 2025. Check out some of his other rides. If you're looking to do some overseas, mexico doesn't sound. Doesn't sound so bad either, by the way, that would be very nice. I know your winter rides are. We've heard a lot of people talk about those, so, um, and, by the way, your international rides are on our list.

Speaker 2: 1:37:59

We're gonna make it to one of them all, right, one of these days, so I definitely gotta bring your spouse e-bikes.

Speaker 4: 1:38:05

Very flat, short miles, very spouse friendly.

Speaker 3: 1:38:09

I think if I went somewhere like that and didn't bring my spouse, you may not have a spouse. Yeah, I don't think. You know, a bouquet of flowers from FTD is going to fix that problem.

Speaker 2: 1:38:21

True story. I think if I yell at an ice cream shop in the middle of Georgia, it's Michael's anniversary.

Speaker 3: 1:38:27

It would have to be something huge like that, yeah.

Speaker 2: 1:38:30

Well, I had a few cocktails, a few whiskeys that night.

Speaker 4: 1:38:33

It worked out. Beautiful man. You brag your anniversary every year, right?

Speaker 3: 1:38:38

It won't be this year, but it has been the last couple of years.

Speaker 4: 1:38:41

Yeah.

Speaker 3: 1:38:41

Because you're doing it a little bit earlier. But yeah, we were at the the. What town was that? The state fair?

Speaker 4: 1:38:49

uh, perry, yeah perry.

Speaker 3: 1:38:50

We're in perry and that was on the day of our anniversary and I really had to do some talking to like is it okay? And I didn't feel good about it and I took a sign that said happy anniversary, chas. And I took every every stop I'd take a picture with me in the sign and put together this big long. You know all these, all these pictures you know, of me doing that and we're sitting there on the anniversary. We're in this malt shop and he stands up and he goes, everybody. I need your help. It's like it's his anniversary and he came here recycling and I need everybody to say, at the count of three, happy anniversary chastity. And so he got the whole entire malt shop to yell happy anniversary chastity. And so he got the whole entire malt shop to yell happy anniversary chastity. I recorded it and then I sent it to her and I get to, I get to go on rides now during my anniversary with no problem nice, don't?

Speaker 2: 1:39:36

thank you, adam and tonight he called me a child sometimes that works to my advantage.

Speaker 3: 1:39:45

I won't deny that.

Speaker 2: 1:39:46

So no, she was touched. I mean, she wrote me afterwards and she's like oh, that's great, I'm you know. But uh, yeah, we, right before we got on the bus, um, our friend Matt helped us.

Speaker 2: 1:39:57

Uh, we, we went to like a hobby lobby and you, you, you went in and got the board got the supplies to make the make the board adventures fun, mean those are, those are the kind of stories that you know you can tell, and and people that you meet along the way. That's why we do this. So, um, definitely, definitely, highly looking forward to it. So, um so, once again, rome, georgia, cartersville, jasper, overnight town, dawson's, cartersville, toka, and.

Speaker 4: 1:40:27

Clarksville and Toccoa, toccoa.

Speaker 2: 1:40:33

Yeah, like that one time I said Brazelton, brazelton, the dirt farmer by golly.

Speaker 3: 1:40:40

Who married up? And got the name got the town named after him.

Speaker 2: 1:40:46

So the only thing we haven't touched on and then I'm going to let you close it out, franklin is do you want to talk about your brag light and and with this overnight town and maybe somebody can't join for the whole week? There's some options there, right?

Speaker 4: 1:41:00

Yeah, so if you can't do the whole week, you can ride the first three days or the last three days, and we make it real easy. So we have a shuttle that'll take you back to your start, whether you ride the first three days or the last three days so that's called Brag Light any three consecutive days. Or if you just want to come and do one day say you live in one of these towns and you just want to ride one day to or from your town, we have daily shuttles that'll take you back just one day. So you got options if you don't want to do the whole week.

Speaker 2: 1:41:30

And I just have to add one thing to that, because I felt bad last year. I have some people write me If you are not doing the full week, you do not qualify for the free jersey, and so I just want to be clear about that, because I had some people say hey, I signed up for your team. So if you're looking to get that free jersey and that's something that you find as a good selling point for yourself to be able to get, that as a full week registration and an adult full week adult.

Speaker 3: 1:41:55

Thank you. Yeah, no worries, but you can still be part of our team, even if you're just going for three days.

Speaker 4: 1:41:58

Yeah that's right. You still drink whiskey and cigars again. Probably adults, but you know yeah, probably should be well, we've got.

Speaker 3: 1:42:06

We've got one young man that might join us, who?

Speaker 4: 1:42:09

you know fair enough.

Speaker 2: 1:42:13

Well, franklin, we're going to, we're going to let you close it out. Anything else that you would like to add? I mean the only thing.

Speaker 4: 1:42:19

I can say is that it's a great day.

Speaker 3: 1:42:23

For a bike ride. It will be. Thank you so much.

Speaker 2: 1:42:25

Thanks, frank, no worries, thank you so much. Thanks, Frank. No worries, thank you guys.

Speaker 1: 1:42:30

Thank you for coming along with Adam and Michael on Road Adventures with Cycling Men of Leisure. If you have enjoyed this, please subscribe to the show on the podcast app of your choice.