Here in America we celebrate all those who have died in the service of our country.
For all of you active duty Instructors, regardless of which country you serve, we offer a complimentary six-month membership to ICI/PRO with our thanks for your service đ
You can use the contact form on the right or drop me a note john@indoorcycleinstructor.com and we'll get you all set up.
If you know an enlisted Instructor please forward this to them and thank them for their service.
What are you doing this day?
The weather looks like it's going to be fabulous and my normal Monday morning class has been canceled. So watch for Amy and myself out on The Bus – our red Trek Tandem. We'll be putting in some much needed mileage, in preparation for this years MS 150 that happens next month.
I would really appreciate it if you would donate! Please click the MS banner at the top of the page đ
Something about this movie trailer moved me to the point where I made a donation to support the production of this film. It wasn't much, only $25, but as I begin year #51 it really spoke to me and I wanted to show my support.
Maybe it was this quote, right at the end, that got me:
I don't know what's around the corner for me. I've never been so fulfilled, not knowing.
Kickstarter.com is a community where you can submit your funding needs for just about anything you're working on. It could be a new invention, business start up or documentary film like I'm fine, Thanks
If you agree with the message, at the very least please go and Like the page. Once they've reached their fundraising goal they will complete the film and provide digital downloads for all the contributors to the project. If you donate $25 they'll send you a DVD. My plan is to show it in a class this fall.
I know we've got a lot of fiftyish Instructors here. I'd love to know if you're feeling like you've maybe been climbing the wrong wall yourself?
Our latest Audio PROfile comes from Team ICGÂŽ Master Trainer Jim Karanas!
PROFILE DESCRIPTION
Timing is one of the most basic essentials of training. I like to think of Timing as âhow you interact with what you perceive.â The road is the road. At times, it will come at you in ways that are unpredictable. How you ride your bike depends largely on your sense of timing or how you make the subtle adjustments necessary to maximize your sense of ease. Exhilaration results when you experience effortless power. Effortless power is a result of good timing.
When a novice rides the bike, they are unsure of what gear to use and will at times fight the bike and the road. As their timing develops, their gear selection and shifting improve to where they no longer have to think about it and they begin to sense âflowâ. Flow is a feeling of simplicity when you sense no difficulty. The bike rolls over the terrain seamlessly, like a dream.
Developing a sense of timing begins through cadence exercises. Cadence is how fast you pedal. Your RPM.  Cadence training makes you more efficient, improves your technique, uses a wider array of muscles and enhances your presence when training. It is a mechanical practice that requires patience and discipline but will eventually help lift you to a level of artistry.
Timing & Cadence Playlist in Spotify and Deezer – please note the substitutions and slight variations in track lengths. You'll need to adjust section times accordingly.
What began as a crazy dream I had while face-down and bored with swimming laps, turned out to be a lot of fun. Hosting a conference is a lot of work to be sure – huge amounts of stress and plenty of anxiety… but getting the chance to meet so many of you in person was actually really special to me, Amy and everyone else on the ICI/PRO team đ
Boston is a wonderful town and really worked well for our first two events. The hotel was very accommodating and Boston is local to a number of the people on our team including; Tom Scotto, Bill Pryor and Andrea Flaherty, our event coordinator. I'll never forget the experience of navigating a U-Haul truck, full of indoor cycles (courtesy of Bill Pryor who shut down one of his studios for the weekend) through the madness of New England traffic.
After two successful events in Boston, survey respondents asked that we move West. So we began looking for a new venue to host the ICI/PRO conference somewhere in the middle of America. Of course it needs to be in a city that is easy to fly into… which limited our search to a handful of cities with major airports. Understanding that a big part of the charm of our first two events was having everything under one roof – most everyone stayed in the hotel where the all the events occurred – had us looking for a similar facility. The venue we were looking for also needed to be open to hosting a fitness conference of 150 or so people and most importantly be somewhere we could afford. Hotel ballroom and meeting room rentals are incredibly expensive – which has me petrified at the prospect of financing two weddings, for my two daughters, in the future. Â
In the end we were unsuccessful in finding a location. To be perfectly honest the effort left me exhausted and without the passion and enthusiasm needed to champion a third event.
I can't let the opportunity pass to again thank everyone who attended our two ICI/PRO conferences! Your willingness to spend hard earned dollars to attend one or both of the events humbles me to this day. Thank You.
And I need to extend the same thank you to everyone (presenters, sponsors and volunteers) who had a hand in the actual events. In particular I need to thank the the major sponsors who literally took a big risk on me. Each of the following invested a considerable amount of time, money and effort. Missing any one of their contributions and we would not have had either of our conferences.
Darren Pelkey from Keiser Indoor Cycles
Gene Nacey with Cycling Fusion
Bill Pryor from Spynergy Consulting
Laurel Mylin and Cameron Chinatti with Stages Indoor Cycling
Barbara Hoots from Indoor Cycle Design
Will we have another event in the future? Who knows⌠Through this process I've developed relationships with a number of other event producers. We weren't able to make anything work this year, but you never know.
Now if you got to the end of this and you find yourself thinking; “so what are you going to do with all your extra time John?” Â I have a good answer for that. We are at this very moment planning and designing a number of new features that we feel will really benefit Indoor Cycling Instructors and ICI/PRO members. We'll be rolling these out in time for the next indoor season, this Fall.
After all, my passion for innovating is as strong as ever. So stay tuned đ
It's a beautiful sunny Minnesota summer day here and I was enjoying it out on my old mountain bike. One of the reasons Minneapolis is as such a bicycle friendly city are the trails running everywhere. I really enjoy these smooth gravel paths because I can spend a couple hours JRA – Just Riding Along – link to a full description without any real conscious effort of watching for cars or the other things that tend to consume you when you're out in traffic.
I used JRA to describe that first ventilatory threshold, VT1. It's the place; above chatty yet below focused effort, communicating the VT1 to the students in my class. It's a wonderful place to spend a few hours and when I'm here, working aerobically, my creative juices really start flowing.
So I'm JRA, when I came upon the sign alerting me that the trail was underwater. “Oh great, now I'm going to get all wet,” I thought. If you spend any time on the road or on a mountain bike, you know that a wet stripe up your back or soaked feet doesn't really add to an enjoyable time outside đ
I've ridden this trail for years. I realized that “trail underwater” typically means there's two or 3 inches of water from the surrounding swamp (I refuse to call it a “wet-lands”… it's a swamp), covering the trail. And I was right.
There are two strategies you can use to cross these little mini rivers, while staying as dry as possible; If the water's only a few inches deep the trick is to peddle as slowly as possible, minimizing any spray up your back. A little deeper and you'll be pedaling your feet through water, so you'll sacrifice I wet back to keep your feet dry. This requires a bit more finesse and can challenge your bike handling skills. You accelerate to the speed that you think you're going to need in order to coast all the way to the other edge, keeping your feet level, up and out of the water. Doesn't always work perfectly. You sometimes stall before the end and wind up doing a sort of rocking motion with your feet, engaging the freewheel through a small segment of the circle, hoping to propel your self forward, while keeping your feet out of the water and not falling over – which would defeat the whole exercise.Â
The challenge is going just slow enough.
After successfully navigating the water hazard and resuming JRA, I was thinking about how we're always talking about the maximum in class; the highest, what's your threshold heart rate, find your FTP, how long can you sustain this, etc. But we rarely try to define the other side of it… how slow or low should you go?
If you've taught for any length of time you've experience the “spinner”. That person who seems to think they're accomplishing something while furiously pedaling with no resistance. Having indoor cycles with power changes that. As part of my initial orientation I give a new student, I'll have them peddle with no resistance and watch the display. On the FreeMotion bikes no resistance equals no power. And it's a wonderful illustration to help people understand the futility of peddling and not really accomplishing anything of value.
[wlm_firstname] I'm not sure that I have the whole answer here so feel free to share your ideas.Â
I'm a big believer that every minute of class should be of value. Just as there are times outdoors when you have to go slowly, you are being productive… still moving yourself forward.
I try to communicate this need for productivity in every class I teach. I'll frequently lament the fact that I only have them for an hour. 60 min. isn't really that long, so let's not waste our time doing nothing.
How I cue this is easier with power, but the feeling is the same. I'll have everyone start the class with zero resistance. I'll ask everyone to find a comfortable cadence and begin adding resistance. I'll explain that productivity for each of us is different, and yet if were honest with ourselves we understand when we're there. My morning classes are typically a bunch of “A” types and I'll make the comment that busy work is not the same as productive work. “Just going through the motions may give the appearance of work to others, but deep down you understand whether you're truly being productive or not.”
My feelings are that riding “productively” should bring everyone to a HR near to or right at VT1 / base of Zone three in a five Zone system.
I reinforce the need for productivity at the end of the long interval. Recovery should be productive. I'll suggest to everyone that once they have recovered to the point where they feel some calm in their breathing, they need to return to that place of productivity – catching their Heart Rate at VT1 / JRA.
There'll be plenty of time, to fully recover, once we've crossed to the other side.[plulz_social_like width=”350″ send=”false” font=”arial” action=”like” layout=”standard” faces=”false” ]
