Over the past week, I've observed or participated in 11 Indoor Cycling classes, lead by Master Trainers and everyday Instructors. In the very first class I attended, by a popular MI, I found myself critiquing the quality of her amplified voice. It was terrible. I could hardly understand what she was saying and it really diminished what she was presenting. I'm sure that if she was aware of how poorly she sounded, she would have taken steps to correct the problem.
I'm super anal about the sound quality of my guests on the Podcast. I request demand that we use Skype when recording remotely. It's typically crystal clear and has the guest sounding like they're in the same room with me. I'll only accept using a phone line on very rare occasions.
So with all that in mind I made a point of critiquing every class I attended, listening for the following:
Can I clearly understand what's being said?
Was there a clear difference in volume between their speaking voice and the music?
I'm not going to call out anyone in specific, but in a number of the workshops and classes I had a difficult time understanding the cues given. None of the classes lead by men had the issue – only the women… and only those with naturally high voices. Now I realize that many of these classes were at a conference, with temporary sound systems, but that didn't appear to contribute to the difficulty understanding the presenters. I sat in on two team taught rides, where multiple presenters spoke (male and female) and it was only the female presenters who I had trouble understanding. I wanted to be sure it wasn't just me, so each time I had trouble hearing I asked other's in the class. In each instance they confirmed the issue.
The importance of hearing it for yourself.
I've encouraged you to record your class, so you can hear firsthand what your class hears. We devoted an entire podcast to the subject that featured communication expert Alexa Fischer.
You maybe surprised by what you hear.
I recorded this short sample a few months ago for another Instructor. She cringed when she heard it and instantly understood that she needed to make some major changes, if she wanted her class to understand what she was cuing. As it was, you barely understand anything she said đ
So, what are potential solutions?
#1 Get off your bike. When was the last time you walked to the middle of the room while you're teaching? If you've been reluctant to do this, here's another reason to hop off and work the room; you'll hear your amplified voice as your class hears it. If you don't like what you hear, then make some changes and run back out to see if it's improved.
NOTE: I don't feel you can depend on your class to give you accurate feedback. If you ask “how do I sound?” they don't have anything to compare to and will typically say “great” so they don't hurt your feelings. Better to hear for yourself.Â
#2Deliver from your lower register. Women (and men) with high-pitched voices need to learn to deliver their voice from their diaphragm. The feeling should be that you're breathing out while speaking, not like holding your breath.
#3 S l o w  d o w n  y o u r  s p e e c h… Slow down and breath = your words will come across much better. If you ever feel short of breath while teaching, your vocal quality is probably suffering. The easiest fix for this is just stop talking until or limit your cues to short sentences.
#4 Consider purchasing a different microphone. I don't have specific knowledge about what mics work best with what voice type, but I do know that every mic is different and you may improve your delivery with a different mic. Would this make for an interesting Podcast?
Cameron Chinatti with Stages Indoor Cycling has an interesting webinar series going that she calls “The 7 Layer Cue Cake”.
Calling all indoor cycling instructors: It's time to get cookin'! If you spend countless hours slaving away over your playlists, substantial time concocting the perfect class plan and you still feel at a loss for the right words, then this webinar series is for you! Join CameronChinatti, Director of Education for Stages Indoor Cycling for this 7-part webinar series dedicated entirely to the art and science of meaningful cuing.
You can learn more and register for the other live presentations here.
Download the first presentation here > Right Click > Save As. Or click the link and it should open in a player. It's a big video file so you'll need to wait for it đ
After interviewing representatives from both Saris and Keiser, I have watched the debate about Indoor Cycling Bikes with power readings i.e. Keiser M3 vs. CycleOps Pro 300PT, with great interest. The CycleOps Pro 300PT IC Bike uses a version of their “Powertap” hub to sense torque. The Keiser M3's method of sensing torque isn't obvious so I decided to dig a little deeper and get some answers. I sent the following email to Darrin Pelkey, the VP Sales & Marketing at Keiser.Hi Darrin,
I didn't dig deep enough into this question during my interview with Suzette O'Byrne
How is the wattage computed on the M3? There is a lot of discussion / confusion on the forums as to how Keiser measures force without using a strain gauge in the pedal crank or wheel hub. Is it an estimate or actual power reading? Is there a calibration process?
See this thread – http://innercycling.com/f/showthread.php?t=8542I understand the basic physics and I'm an engine guy so I understand that most dyno's use eddy currents to load and measure power but I don't understand how you get your power readings on the M3.
I would love to inform my readers & listeners if possible.Here is Darrin's response:John,
First and foremost the M3 is not a ergometer nor is it priced like one. Power is an estimate. The price and our maximum usage (group exercise) dictate that it is not for testing and it cannot be calibrated. Though we do have some people that have used it with an IMET test when a bike is more preferential than a treadmill. One thing not mentioned below is magnet strength, they are consistent and do not weaken over the life of the bike.
To answer the question:Watts are calculated from the gear setting. A potentiometer is attached to the magnet holder (the round cone shaped disc at the end of the shifter cable). As the shifter is moved, the cable rotates the magnet holder. A potentiometer is rotated by the rotation of the magnet holder, thus feeding information to the computer on the position of the magnet holder. The rotation of the potentiometer is broken down into 24 gear settings. A dynamometer was used to test and develop a table of wattage at various gear settings and speeds. The speed of the crank is determined by a magnet attached to the large pulley on the right crank arm and a magnetic switch attached to the circuit board in the magnet holder assembly. Each time the magnet on the pulley passes by the magnetic switch, a signal is sent to the computer to compute the RPM's of the crank arm. Power equals force times velocity. The force is determined by the magnet position and the speed by the crank speed. The lookup table is programmed into the computer and the computer simply looks at the gear setting and speed and goes to the lookup table to find and display the Watts for those two settings.
Darrin Pelkey
VP Sales & Marketing at Keiser
The Power in Human PerformanceNow my two-cents as to Actual or Estimated â does it mater? Short answer â No. My feeling is that any bike that displays consistent and repeatable power readings is a vast improvement over any non-power based IC bike.
There are many ways that you can pick both bikes apart; CycleOps has actual power readings yet the M3 has (in my opinion) a vastly superior system for creating load/resistance. The heaver flywheel on the CycleOps causes inaccuracies in power readings â in their words: Why are there discrepancies between my PowerTap numbers and my Indoor Cycle numbers? Due to the external factors of riding a bike outside vs. riding a solid indoor cycle, you may experience different values on your PowerTap. Also, with the special design of the flywheel, inertia plays a much bigger role in your workout on the Indoor Cycle vs. riding your bike on the road. For instance, a larger effort is required to get your Indoor Cycle flywheel up to a certain speed, but due to inertia, the flywheel will spin much longer than a regular bicycle wheel, resulting in less work being required to maintain that predesignated speed.
For personal use, I'd say it's a wash… or more of a Ford vs. Chevy argument.If I was a club owner I would pick the M3. Less capital cost, it appears to need much less maintenance (calibrate 50 bikes each day? I don't think so) and how many of our members have a road bike with power?
You'll be quicker up Pikes Peak after a winter training indoors with power!
While Performance Enhancement Specialist Dennis Mellon and I were getting warmed up to record his Audio Class PROfile Mashup – HIIT vs. Party on the Bike, we spent a few minutes discussing his thoughts and observations on coaching with power.
Were his participants seeing any improvement after a full winter training indoors with power?
If so, how are they comparing their performance year to year?
Has Star Trac been able to improve the consistence / accuracy of the Blade Ions?
Can we depend on riders bringing their own technology (HR Monitor, iPhone App, ect…) to class for the purpose of tracking performance?
Or is it better to provide rider data/metrics tracking as a service of the studio?
During our conversation Dennis makes an interesting comment about a summer class format, that could be of interest to the cyclists and endurance athletes who abandoned you this Spring. Many training plans call for very specific HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training) – which is difficult to complete on the road, but easy to do indoors. It may make sense to ask one of the local endurance coaches in your area if they would be interested in bringing their athletes indoors once a week to your studio.
You can learn more about Dennis here at his website.
If you'd like to learn more about automated rider data/performance tracking from Performance IQ with the Spinner Blade Ion or any of the other Indoor Cycles with power, please contact me and I'll connect you with the right people.
Indoor Triathlons are very popular here in the frozen north, offering club triathletes the chance to swim bike and run long before its warm enough to be outside.
In the past, the Life Time club where I teach used Spinner NXTs with a Spinning computer for the bike leg. Participants would run up from the pool, jump on a bike and pedal as fast as they can until the reached the prescribed distance. The clever one's figured out that the amount of resistance they used had no effect on how quickly the computer added mileage, so you had a bunch of flailing legs @ 130 RPM with no resistance = not really doing any real work đ
But not this year…
With all of our NXTs being replaced with Indoor Cycles with power, the participants in the Indoor Tri actually needed to “TRY” and ended up really working for their mileage this year!
I took this picture while I was riding a FreeMotion S11.0 at 115 RPM, but with no resistance. You can see in the display that even though I was pedaling very fast, I wasn't producing any power because I had zero resistance. No power = no speed and more importantly, no distance is recorded.
I talked with a couple of finishers about their experience, especially what the bike leg was like, compared to last year.
“It was a lot harder.”
“More like riding outdoors.”
“I completely over did it trying to keep up with the guy next to me. My legs were junk by the time I started the run.”
