Hey John,
As the Olympics have started – I wondered if you could remind me of some of the class profiles that ICI/Pro has published that involve participation from the class as a group ; ie. friendly competition? I am pretty sure there was at least one post like that – I just can't seem to recall the title.
Thanks again. ICI Pro has been a great resource for me.
Best,
Barb
Thanks Barb – Yes, we do indeed have just such a ride 🙂
Created by Stages Indoor Cycling Master Trainers; Cameron Chinatti and Pam Benchley, Saturday with Stages BIG RIDE is a team focused class and a big hit at our our last ICI/PRO conference in 2011. Wouldn't it be cool if we could do this again?
At the time of this conference, the FreeMotion Indoor Cycles were brand new – we were so honored to have them as a sponsor of this event. In retrospect, watching this video now two years later, it's easy to see why Cameron and co. have become such an important players in our industry!
The film crew from Cycling Fusion shot this video during the event. Unfortunately our license to display this video ended a while back – so we haven't had it available. Barb's email prompted me to ask Gene Nacey and he's letting us display this video profile yet again 🙂
[!private ‘PRO-Platinum|PRO-Monthly|PRO-Gratis|PRO-Seasonal|Platinum-trial|Monthly-trial|PRO-Military|30-Days-of-PRO|90 Day PRO|Stages-Instructor|Schwinn-Instructor|Instructor-Bonus|28 Day Challenge']
Cameron and I also recorded a companion Audio PROfile to go along with this video + a pdf you can download and print out. I'm re-publishing it so it will trigger the auto-email announcement 🙂
Last year I had the pleasure of interviewing Michael Sadvec, co-owner of Fit On Indoor Cycling Studio located in Manhattan Beach, CA. Michael shared with us his plans for their upcoming Tour de Pier, which was a big success!
Tour de Pier is back again this year and Michael sent me a note asking for my help promoting the event. They're planning to raise a half million dollars to be distributed to the; Hirshberg Foundation for Pancreatic Cancer Research (pancreatic.org), The LiveSTRONG Foundation (livestrong.org) and Cancer Support Community (cancersupportredondobeach.org)
John,
I hope all is well!
Tour De Pier is right around the corner… May 18th! This year we should smash our $350.000 mark and are already at $256.000 with over a month to go. Goal is $500,000.00 (http://www.tourdepier.com/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=1086425) Mad Dogg Athletics is donating all of the bikes this year and we should be close to 300 or more. Would love it if you could give us a shout out.
This year they are partnering with a SoulCycle studio located in Greenwich, CT – where I see they've already sold out all of their available bikes 🙂 There are still spots open for the Mahatten Beach event – more info here.
You can learn more about Tour de Pier and possibly pick up a few ideas you could apply to hosting a charity ride of your own, by listening to this podcast
Every year it's the same. We all have high aspirations that the weather will be nice enough to ride what's called the Minnesota Ironman Bicycle Ride. Not a true Ironman (no swimming or running thank God), this Ironman is the first large, organised/supported ride of the season. It gets its name from the notoriously crappy weather we normally have here in Minnesota the last Sunday in April and the foolish people who enjoy riding in it.
Twenty years ago freezing temps and a little rain wouldn't have stopped me from attending. Not having anything more to prove, I'm one of the first to politely decline any invitations – unless the forecast calls for a reasonably decent day. Rain is a non-starter, which was exactly what we experienced this morning. Add to that 37° F + 22 mph cross winds and a bunch of us found ourselves inside the warm and dry studio at Life Time Fitness 🙂
I like to ride with my class during long endurance rides. As this wasn't a regularly scheduled class, I have the freedom to sit in and enjoy the class with my friends and get the same workout as everyone else.
But I'm still “The Instructor” and everyone still expects a proper class. I start with an intro about how, as endurance athletes, we're all pretty self directed – so I'm going to be giving everyone a minimum amount of cuing and they will do the work they need to do.
My classes always include power and the first 15 minutes typically follow the same general format.
Warm Up — 10 minutes. 5 minutes of gradual increases in wattage. During the second 5 mins. we’re finding the wattage where everyone is first noticing a change in breathing; VT1 / Aerobic Threshold = the top of the Recover Zone. This establishes a rough understanding of a Base Level Wattage that we use throughout the rest of class.
3 x 30 sec. Hard / 30 sec. Easy – Openers to AT/LT. I cue these by first having everyone find the amount of load @ 70 RPM that has them feeling they should (not just could) come out of the saddle. The 30 sec. Hard is then simply accelerating to 90+ RPM which results in some pretty impressive power numbers. The 30 sec. Easy is back to 70 RPM — many will stand during the Easy portion.
1-3 minutes rest – I encourage riders to focus on their recovery. Once they feel calm in their breathing, bring back the Base Level Wattage.
3-5 min. Hard Effort — Here’s a “Best Effort” to establish a benchmark PTP Personal Threshold Power (top of the Perform Zone) or ride at 110% of FTP if known. It’s very helpful to riders to have that understanding of their personal upper wattage number. The “Best Effort” Threshold # + the Base Threshold # we found earlier form the three Power working zones I use in class. This “Best Effort also helps everyone understand where they are today… on this bike. Despite the efforts of our maintenance people, there are differences in the displayed wattage between bikes. My power meter was indicating that superman must have been riding it because I was seeing 320 watts, when I normally push ~240 watts at threshold.
With an Epic Planet DVD providing the entertainment, and me perched front & center between two regulars, we were off to virtually ride this year's Ironman indoors.
My cuing was very simple; depending on the song, we would ride at Base Level Wattage, Best Effort or something in between. Two hours is a long time to keep anyone's attention – so don't feel you need to. They're self-directed after all. Stand when you feel you need to and then give them a hard push at the end. You needn't make it any more difficult than that.
About 10 days after hitting a SoulCycle class on a recent day off, Barry’s Bootcamp owner Joey Gonzalez got a phone call. It was a lawyer for the mega-popular cycling brand issuing a message: don’t come back.
“He essentially said we have a policy at SoulCycle where instructors at other group fitness studios are not allowed to take class,” Gonzalez says. “He seemed half embarrassed.” We reached out to SoulCycle’s public relations team for comment on the policy but did not hear back.
Gonzalez took to Facebook with the news, and his post went viral. (At time of this writing, it had 158 comments and 14 shares.) Other popular fitness instructors, like Natalie Uhling, Darryl Gaines, and Lindsey Clayton weighed in to say the same thing had happened to them. Flywheel instructors jumped in to invite trainers from other studios to come take their classes (“#team”), and tons of people weighed in to rail against the lack of “soul” the policy stood for.
Then I dug in to this story a bit more. The article references this post from rateyourburn.com addressing the same issue. They begin with listing a few reasons why it maybe OK to limit the access of Instructors from competing fitness clubs. I see it as incomplete… in fact, I feel they are missing the real concerns of Soul Cycle completely.
IS IT OKAY FOR FITNESS STUDIOS TO BAN INSTRUCTORS WHO WORK FOR THE COMPETITION?
Why do studios ban instructors employed by competitors?
Trade secrets. We suppose the primary reason studios do this is to prevent competitors from coming in and spying on their ways of business, copying them or stealing their methods.
Exclusivity. Perhaps some studios want to create a country club bubble, where only approved members are allowed within their establishment.
To ward off studio-bombing. On rare occasions, people do show up just to cause trouble. In our opinion, bad behavior is the only justifiable reason to ban a paying client.
Limiting access to your “Tribe”
Paul Harmeling from Full Psycle Studio really opened my eyes about what makes Soul Cycle so successful – how good they are at cultivating a “team” or “tribe” of passionate people who are united by their participation in class. This sense of community isn't just between the customers and Soul Cycle or the Instructor. There are a lot of relationships, both personal and professional, being made between the riders.
You've probably seen this at your club. It's no secret that common interests and activities build trust between people. That trust can lead to relationships that extend beyond the club. Over the years my family and I have chosen to do business with people we've gotten to know at our club;
Claudia is Amy and my financial planner – she's also been a longtime regular in our classes.
Amy first met Craig at the club. He later hired her and we've been friends of Craig and his wife Julie for 15 years.
Morry (another regular) arranged for daughter Abby's interview, which resulted in her current job.
Richard is an Instructor at our club. He's also a C level employee at a company where younger daughter Carly would like to have a summer internship…
I can easily understand why Soul Cycle (or your club for that mater) would want to limit access to their Tribe of passionate, fitness minded people who have the financial wherewithal to pay for premium classes.
Wouldn't these same people be prospective customers for any fitness business – especially a competitor located near by?
Soul Cycle's “Tribe” is really their brand, the “special sauce” that makes them unique and profitable. Using attorneys to protect a brand from competitors isn't really any different from how Mad Dogg Athletic will do the same thing to protect the Spinning® brand from improper use.
I don't know anymore than what's been written, but I would venture this guess; Soul Cycle was concerned that Mr. Gonzalez was recruiting customers for his boot camp business. Neither of the articles, nor the Facebook post, explains how Soul Cycle's attorney would know Gonzalez was an Instructor… unless someone (maybe a class participant?) informed management.
The TRX Suspension Trainer and Indoor Cycling look like they were meant for each other. Check out this video from Instructor – Personal Trainer Pam Leno where she demonstrates the Cycling/Strength fusion class she calls: Buff, Bike & Balance!
