Wouldn't it be cool to have a teleprompter to work off of?
I've found myself getting a little lazy with my class introduction – that opening statement that answers the question many of your participants have before the class begins; “I wonder what we're doing today… and how hard we're doing it?” A consistent and informative opening statement is a major part of any successful class, one that I see as a Best Practice.
In retrospect, I should have committed to delivering a more informative class intro for challenge #1 of the 28 day challenge. If you aren't taking the challenge #1 was:
#1 – We all have areas where we know we could improve. Today's challenge is to publicly commit to one tangible improvement at least for the next 27 days of the challenge (e.g.: start your class on time, spend more time helping new students, not be in a hurry to leave, build in more warmup into your profile, etc..)
So better late than never, we've create a specific challenge to encourage Instructors (and Me) to create a Scripted Start for their next class:
#15 — Create a scripted class opening: “Great actors don’t show up on set and improvise as soon as the camera starts rolling. They practice putting their own personality into the words scripted for them…. Practice delivering your opening and closing scripts and you’ll be as polished as a professional actor.”
You will find a podcast transcript (includes a link) of an interview with Lawrence Biscontini in the group Files folder that will give you a lot of direction. Post your completed script.
So John… what do you have planned for us today?
In what I feel was one of, if not the best, interviews I've ever published, MI Lawrence Biscontini describes the elements of what he calls a “Scripted Start”. Lawrence explains that there are nine points you should include in your initial opening statement:
Welcome
Intensity
New Students
Gratitude
Sound and Equipment
Teaser
Theme
Issues
Purpose
I know that sounds like a lot to squeeze in, but in reality you should be able to smoothly touch on all nine points in a reasonably short paragraph. And your introduction doesn't have to these in order, you can mix them up anyway that makes sense to your personality – just be sure to include everything.
Here is the link to Lawrence's interview – we've included a transcript for those of you who prefer to read, rather than listen.
Now If you find yourself thinking; John and Lena have creating a “Scripted Start” as a challenge for this week… I wonder if one of next week's challenges is going to be about drafting a “Flawless Finally”? You're right 🙂
Have ever asked your class; what do you want from me?
It's a very different question than; do you like my class? or; do you like my music? or; what could I do better/different?
Challenge #6, of the ICI/PRO 28 Day Instructor Challenge, was pretty simple:
#6 Ask some of your participants to fill out the feedback form after your class.
The PDF download we provided asked just one question:
Getting honest feedback from people can be maddeningly difficult. Mostly it's because people will often lie to you when they are concerned the truth could hurt your feelings. So we designed this question to get a response that indicates a preference vs. a response that would be a critique. Consider how you would respond to these two questions, asked from your mother when you still lived at home:
#1 – What would you like for dinner?
Vs.
#2 – Would you like my meatloaf for dinner?
Question #1 asks for your preference and you wouldn't feel a bit concerned by responding honestly with; I'd like your lasagna tonight Mom.
But question #2 is very different and most of us (if Mom's meatloaf is better used as a doorstop) might have a difficult time answering honestly 🙁
So if Mom's intent is to cook a meal that pleases you, she'll take your suggestion and do what she can to make you lasagna for dinner tonight. Then you'll be happy (you feel valued as a son or daughter) because Mom delivered based on your preference. And, because pleasing you makes her feel like she's a good Mother, Mom's happy as well!
But consider what happens when Mom asks question #2 (or doesn't ask either question) and just decides what you want/need for dinner… you show up for dinner and your first thought is; doesn't she know how much I dislike her meatloaf? Followed with; I love her lasagna, why doesn't she just ask me what I would like for dinner and I would tell her.
Now I realise that this is a pretty simplistic illustration, but does that sound anything like your role as an Instructor?
So what happened? What were the responses our challenge participants received from their classes? Here's a few:
Would your class respond differently? Or similarly? Click to download the survey PDF.
The Scosche armband heart rate strap uses optical sensors to “see” the pulses of blood flow in the blood vessels in your arm. Groundbreaking technology and pretty cool stuff if you ask me. Anything to get rid of those monitor chest straps will be an improvement. I feel this will result in a greater number of people training more effectively. You can read an earlier post where I describe the Scosche as possibly the best heart rate monitor strap option for participants in our classes that include any of the new Indoor Cycles with power consoles – except the Keiser M3 or M3i.
The new Apple iWatch uses the same optical sensor technology and it will be interesting to see how the two match up.
Jon Ham is a fitness consultant to Scosche and has written a detailed comparison between what he sees as the differences between the Scosche and the iWatch. You can read it here. [Understand that Jon's comments about the iWatch are based on information provided by Apple – the iWatch isn't available for purchase yet.]
As a side note, I've been trading emails with a former Schwinn Master Trainer who's involved in the iWatch project and (fingers crossed) I hope to interview him about the fitness applications of the iWatch once it's released.
The part I found most interesting in Jon's article was the part about data collection
Is the Apple Watch Designed to be a Continuous Heart Rate Monitor for intense exercise?
The way I saw it, In Tim Cook’s presentation, the Apple Watch was shown to be an excellent Activity/Life monitor, where movement, lifestyle, and general health were emphasized, and not heart rate training. I could be wrong, but I think Apple knows heart rate is not going to be super accurate during exercise with the Apple Watch, therefore they built the Watch around making a great interface for activity monitoring – IE: how often you stand up throughout the day, pedometer information, etc. This will surely play out to be a thorn in the side of FitBit and other activity monitors, but I don’t think it poses a threat to serious heart rate training athletes.
Data Centralization
I think Apple knows their job is to centralize the data collected from accurate sensors, not to necessarily create the sensor itself – except for activity monitoring. For example, Health Kit will allow all connected apps to push data that has been collected from different sensors directly into Apple’s Health App. I don’t see Apple getting into the Blood Pressure monitor or blood glucose monitor business any time soon, but apps that monitor blood pressure and blood glucose can push their data to Apple Health. I DO like the way the Apple Health App will centralize that information into one health app, along with other health related metrics. It makes sense to have all that data in one centralized location. The bottom line is that you should be able to use other heart rate sensors to do your workout and gather accurate data, you won’t be confined to only using the Apple Watch to collect accurate heart rate data.
Time will tell if Jon is accurate about this and if so, there's a chance we'll want to be wearing both an iWatch and a Scosche armband when we exercise.
David Bowie is my favorite artist of all time and I'm going to be in Chicago next month. There's no way I will miss this!
It’s David Bowie Day In Chicago
Last week, Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel declared September 23rd (today) “David Bowie Day” in honor of the city’s connection with David Bowie Is, a career retrospective that is making its U.S. debut at the Museum Of Contemporary Art Chicago. The exhibition has already been displayed in London, Berlin, Sao Paulo, and Toronto, and will open in Chicago today.
I read about the David Bowie Is exhibit when it was in London and now it's at the Museum Of Contemporary Art Chicago
David Bowie Is presents the first retrospective of the extraordinary career of David Bowie–one of the most pioneering and influential performers of our time. More than 400 objects, most from the David Bowie Archive–including handwritten lyrics, original costumes, photography, set designs, album artwork, and rare performance material from the past five decades–are brought together for the first time.
If you're a Bowie fan, and plan to attend Club Industry next month, you just might want to plan an extra day to see this 🙂
Display tracking of each rider's performance during an Indoor Cycling class is proving to be very motivating for the riders and profitable for the studio owners because those participants keep coming back.
Customer retention is hugely important to keeping your classes full. I hear over and over; “once you've shown me my performance, up on a screen and then on that email I get after class, I'm hooked. Why would I ever go back to that Big Box club, who doesn't show me anything?”
Jennifer Ashbrook is the owner of Inner Drive Cycling | Fitness Studio in Newtown Square, PA. Jennifer's studio features FreeMotion S11.9 indoor cycles that provide the performance data that drives the Spivi Display Training system she purchased to differentiate her studio, from other competing fitness clubs in her area.
Jennifer created this short video to help her prospective customers understand Spivi and how it adds to the “WOW” factor of her classes.
You can learn more about Jennifer and her studio by listening to our interview.
I forgot to talk about … It's common for guests to contact me, post interview, with a point or two that they felt should have been included, but weren't. Jennifer emailed me to add:
Hi John,
I just wanted to thank you for the chance to talk with you about Spivi this morning — I really enjoyed it! A couple of things I think maybe I should clarify about Spivi that I forgot to mention — when I explained how Spivi “normalizes” or handicaps riders, I indicated that they are normalized based on power output — and that’s a major part of the equation for bikes with power — but the system also takes into account cadence; it factors all of that together and “ranks” riders based on “Spivi Points” — which (as I understand it) factors in riders age, weight, gender, FTP (if know and power data is available), and cadence — perhaps other factors… The system can also pick up heart rate from ANT+ heart rate straps.
