New ICI/PRO feature will make teaching even easier đ
To celebrate the start of year 4Â we are introducing PRO/Playlists, a new benefit for our ICI/PRO Yearly Platinum Members that will make your annual membership an even better value.
By design, the primary benefit of ICI/PRO is saving you time [convenience]. We try to make it easy for passionate, yet busy Instructors to quickly find what they need to teach an awesome class.
Only ICI/PRO delivers Audio PROfiles effortlessly to your computer / iPod device via iTunes. A few clicks and the complete profile can be printed so you can Grab It, Go, & Teach a Great Class!
Perfect – except for the class music playlists… they haven't been as simple, easy or convenient as I would like. Sure, we always include a suggested playlist for every PROfile, but it can be a real time suck searching for each track, purchasing it, building the playlist and then transferring it to your iPod.
Not to mention expensive đ
With ten or more songs in each playlist you may be spending $20 – $30 a month on music.
That's all going to change with PRO/Playlists…
Look for ICI/Podcast #168 explaining everything on Sunday 8/7
Experts say that once a business or organization has completed it's third year, the potential for success goes up exponentially!
Well, today, August 2nd 2011, is the 3 year anniversary of the Indoor Cycle Instructor Podcast and www.indoorcycleinstructor.com
And to think that when I started, I was concerned that we would run out of ideas for new posts or Podcasts đ
It all began with this post which introduced my method of organizing music in iTunes based on the concept of Training Rates. Since then we have published an enormous amount of digital content in various forms; 167 Podcast episodes, 44 Audio PROfiles, dozens of videos and over 900 individual posts / pages. They have been viewed or downloaded a crazy number of times.
How crazy? Here are some of the numbers*
~ 750,000 – The number of times the “digital” Amy has told a listener; “Hi, this is Amy, the senior Group Fitness Instructor at the Indoor Cycle Instructor Podcast…”
~ 300,000 – Total hours spend by Instructors listening to the Podcasts
~ 33,000 – Average number of downloads we deliver each month
* It wasn't until September 2009 that I began using a service that would give me accurate data on the number of downloads we deliver each month. It's also important to understand that even though we have over 160 episodes, only the last 80 are available through iTunes.
We do have very accurate data on traffic to indoorcycleinstructor.com starting from day one. These numbers are even more crazy:
170,000 unique visitors came to the site
The made 333,647 visits (how many were yours?)
16,156 of this visits were on a mobile device
They viewed 923,484 pages
4,074 of those page views were through a dial up modem – really?
They're visiting from every continent on the planet (I'm still looking hear from my visitor in the Falkland Islands)
I appreciate your time here with us and I'm firmly convinced that we couldn't have done this without YOU!
Here's to year #4 !
John
P.S. Please don't send gifts. If you want to do something special for me (and YOU) let's celebrate together  register for the conference and I can meet you for real – or –  become a Monthly or Yearly ICI/PRO Member and we can celebrate virtually đ
Heart Zones Master Instructor Laura Sachs contributes our latest Audio PROfile.
Laura recently published an article about heart rate training in the June IDEA Fitness Journal. Here's an excerpt and you read the whole article here.
Heart Rate Monitor Benefits
If an athlete wants to train rather than just to work out, using a heart rate monitor to zone in on the right intensity can help track the workout in an intelligent way. Quantifying an activity makes it possible to plan a course of action based on the outcome measurements and the monitoring of that activity. Clients can use a heart rate monitor to gain an accurate picture of workout intensity, putting absolute numbers such as 160 beats per minute (bpm) into relative numbers or percentages of maximum or threshold.
For example, if the number for a clientââŹâ˘s low threshold (the first metabolic shift from increased intensity) is 140 bpm and the maximum heart rate (HRmax) from a field test measurement is 160 bpm, then the relative number (or percentage) is about 88% of HRmax (also referred to as Zone 3: Aerobic Zone). âLow threshold,â or âfirst threshold,â is referred to as T1 (Foster & Procari 2010).
Edwards has identified five heart rate zones, providing a simple way to set training zones based on participantsââŹâ˘ specific response to exercise intensity.
For decades, fitness enthusiasts have used the 220-minus-age formula (age-adjusted maximum heart rate formula) to mathematically calculate HRmax and thereby derive cardiovascular training zones. According to Carl Foster, PhD, FACSM, professor of exercise and sports science at the University of Wisconsin, La Crosse, and past president of the American College of Sports Medicine, âThe formulaââŹâ˘s 220-minus-age is useless. There is no scientific validation for it.â To replace this generalized formula, Edwards has developed a half-dozen user-friendly field tests to determine both maximum and threshold heart rates that result in personalized zones for each individual. âThe only way to safely and accurately estimate maximum heart rate,â she says, âis to take a submax field test. We can no longer rely on equations that were fabricated and invalid.â
After reading it I asked Laura to record this some of this as an Audio PROfile.
Here's your Spotify PRO/Playlist! Deezer. We have made every attempt to replicate the original playlist. In some instances the tracks specified were unavailable in Spotify. When necessary we have substituted individual songs of similar length and tried to maintain the Instructor's intent.Â
Our tandem team at the look out after the "big climb" finish
Am I alone in being conscience of my form on the bike, when teaching a class?
In any given time there maybe 20 – 40 people in front of me and a few, I'm convinced, are continuously critiquing my form. So I always want to demonstrate a nice smooth pedal stroke, head up, relaxed upper-body and a nice flat back indicative of someone with more than just a few miles on a bike. “In here you are a cyclist.” I'll tell my class while I encourage them to “look” the part.
I haven't shared this with Amy, but about 5 miles into filming Epic Red Wing, a future Epic Ride Indoor Cycling DVD this past weekend it hit me; there will be thousands of cyclists, instructors and students who will be watching this video.Â
That was all it took for me to stay singularly focused on my form, for most of the entire 50 mile ride.
Except for when we crashed… OK, it wasn't really a crash, we tipped over. Well actually just Amy fell off when I couldn't make a very tight turn, on a very steep hill. I got my foot down but unfortunately by the time she realized we weren't going to make it, it was too late. I'm not sure if Allen Jones caught it on film… hopefully he doesn't plan to make a “Funny Epic Rides Bloopers” DVD đ
Getting beyond my personal insecurities, being part of the filming was very fun. I need to thank our Tandem friends Jean and Tony for riding with us.
As he spend most of his time behind the camera, I thought it would be fun for you to meet the producer of Epic Rides, Allen Jones.
Do you have an idea for an Epic Ride location? Allen welcomes your suggestions and you can contact him at his websiteepicplanet.tv
Did you see this new Indoor Cycle from Pro-Form during the tour this year? I'm not sure if it will qualify as a potential replacement for the bikes cycles in your club, but it is fascinating… at least it is to me. So I called the company and we are planning a future interview to learn more about it.
The Pro Form Le Tour de France Indoor Cycling Bike uses the same Magnetic resistance found on the Keiser M3, Schwinn AC and the new FreeMotion s11.9. As I've stated here on multiple occasions, I see Magnetic Resistance as superior in every respect as compared to a friction system; quieter, zero maintenance and most importantly the amount of resistance increases with cadence… just like a real bicycle on the road.
So how about adding pitch into our classes? Realryder has students rocking from side to side, but wouldn't it be cool if we could replicate the up and down of a real road as part of our class profiles?
The Pro-Form TDF can adjust the amount of Incline or Decline so you feel like you are actually climbing or descending.
I can envision having a control knob where I could control everyone's cycle; “going up!”Â
I'm guessing that with a selling price of only $1,300, the Pro Form uses calculated power to arrive at the wattage displayed. That may not be optimal for the hard core Power fanatic, but for the 99% of us who just need a consistant indication of the work we create it's perfect.
Here's the link to the Pro-Form TDF information page.
