by Jim Karanas | Jul 23, 2012 | Master Instructor Blog
By Team ICG® Master Trainer Jim Karanas
“Heroes are made by the paths they choose, not the powers (with which) they are graced.” ― Brodi Ashton
It’s hard not to admire the Tour de France riders, or to watch the commercial for the Olympics and Paralympics with challenged athletes alongside able-bodied athletes, without feeling that elite-level athletes are special. They’ve been gifted with physical abilities that never showed up in my gene pool and have the opportunity to create beauty in competition and sport that I’ll never experience.
Even when I think rationally about what many of them have had to overcome or sacrifice to be where they are, I still feel they’re unique and a cut (or two) above me as an athlete. They are my heroes.
Be Your Own Hero® is a registered trademark of ICG®. We registered it because we were inspired by the overwhelming odds some people have overcome through self-belief, drive and determination. To us, the brand represents empowerment.
ICG believes, however, that it’s important to Be Your Own Hero even if you’re not faced with overwhelming odds. You don’t have to be in dire circumstances to benefit from it. Becoming your own hero is a way of liberating yourself and raising your quality of life. When you choose to see yourself as a hero, you wake up and look forward to discovering what excitement the day can bring.
When you’re conflicted, all you have to do is ask yourself, “What would a hero do?”
As a hero, you’d trust yourself. You’d see yourself through the rough times and emerge stronger. You’d do the right thing.
Let’s say you wake up in the morning and feel really sluggish. Your body aches, whether from training, overtraining, or age. You ask yourself, “What would a hero do?” A hero would get up and face the training for the day, even though he/she didn’t want to and would like nothing more than to turn off the alarm and go back to sleep.
One of my favorite cycling legends is John Howard. Born in 1947, Howard was a three-time U.S. Olympic cyclist and the winner of 14 USA national cycling championships. He won the gold medal in the 1971 Pan American Games road-cycling race in Colombia, was a four-time U.S. National Road Cycling champion, and won the 1981 Ironman Triathlon World Championship in Hawaii.
Howard was one of only four competitors in the first Race Across America (RAAM), originally organized in 1982 by John Marino and called The Great American Bike Race. In 1985, Howard set a land-speed record of 152.2 miles per hour (245 km/h) while motor-pacing (behind a truck) on a pedal bicycle on Utah's Bonneville Salt Flats.
After all of that, John Howard now teaches indoor cycling in the San Diego area. About doing what you and I do every day, he says, “For me, indoor cycling is no longer a poor substitute for the open roads and trails, (but) an indispensable ingredient for penetrating deeply into the inner world of body/mind integration (and) exploring the deepest power patterns of cycling technique. (I)ndoor cycling can actually bring benefits attainable in no other way.”
In DIRT!, the book he wrote from his hospital bed in 1997 after a disabling crash, Howard denounced the Olympics as being about nothing more than medals, with no heart nor soul. He said he had more respect for the amateur athletes and fitness enthusiasts who get out of bed every day to face their own training than for any top-level athlete blessed with ability.
At ICG, we believe that being a hero involves treating each day as an adventure, having enthusiasm about the day and what you’re going to do with it. As Howard’s quotation above shows, a hero brings a hero’s sensibility to everything he or she does. Self-belief is key.
I haven’t missed watching the Tour de France in over a decade. Lance is still one of my greatest heroes. I love the Olympics. Having heroes inspires me.
But I also believe in myself and put on my Spiderman suit every day. I teach what I love, teach it with passion, and hope it improves someone’s day.
Be Your Own Hero. What would that look like for you?
by Gino | Jul 19, 2012 | Master Instructor Blog
Subject’s Composition
The next facet of preparing to launch our study is the issue of sample size & composition. We need a suitable sample size (the number of test subjects or participants) and composition (the demographics and/or physical attributes or “profile”) of the subjects involved in the test to represent a cross section of the population with which you hope to apply these results.
In academia, the university environment and access to talent can often give them pro or elite athletes to work with as subjects of the study. When this is the case, I must confess to wondering if their results and conclusions are more a factor of “good genetics” or of the principles being studied. In other words, would the same sort of results be rendered, perhaps differing in only the degree or amount of the effect, if it had been conducted with subjects that would fall under the average individual type profile.
Subjects Size
While having 10 subjects is one of those nice round numbers that would also help us achieve a cross section within the “normal people” population, we don’t always have the luxury of that many participants, and so rather than linger in the “no-mans land” of inaction, you take what you can get in order to get the study off the ground. However, that being said, the results will also have to then be taken with a grain of salt. Those scrutinizing the end results or findings will examine not only the assumptions and methodologies the study has employed, but the composition and size of the subject group conducting the trials.
Impact on Interpretation
We not only must be cognizant of the subject’s profile, but also how homogeneous that sample group is within itself. We don’t want to miss this detail since we can expect our conclusions ultimately rendered to be interpreted in the light of who completed our trials. This is the test bed of our study.
Sometimes the emphasis on this fact is disproportionate to its impact on the overall results, and can be offered up to explain away unexpected results. In other instances, this impact is clearer and even profound, and consequently may be the most salient insight gained as a result of the research. When either of these positions are offered as qualifying factors of interpretation, I believe the research group is then compelled to repeat the research with a distinctly different, yet also homogenous group; at least once or even twice. These repeated trials should serve to validate or invalidate the relative impact of the subject’s profile and/or sample size on the final results.
In some cases, this repeating and more detailed analysis of the subject group can lead to more accuracy overall to the concepts and principles involved in the research; which is of course one of the best outcomes any researcher can hope for anyway. Better yet, when this repeating of the research is done by a completely different research group, say at another university, the full picture and analysis of the results can become more and more robust.
Start Recruiting!
Getting back to our own “backyard research” (hey, I like that phrase — what think ye — maybe this is the less pretentious way of saying “Evidence Based Cycling”). But yet again I digress…
In our situation today, we will endeavor to use real, ordinary people in our study, and thus we should ultimately be able to establish real, ordinary comparisons and conclusions. While we can debate the word “ordinary” for more time and paper than the subject is worth, we can also just trust our good judgment to recruit and include those subjects whom seem to make up what most people would consider the “general population”.
Bottom line though at this point is that we must recruit individuals willing to be included in the study, and perform the trials we ask them to do, in the frequency and specificity as we dictate. This is no small task, so we better get busy. Once I wrangle enough participants, I’ll return with the next steps to take.
[plulz_social_like width=”350″ send=”false” font=”arial” action=”like” layout=”standard” faces=”false” ]
by Joan Kent | Jul 16, 2012 | Master Instructor Blog
By Team ICG® Master Trainer Joan Kent
OK, it’s mean for sure. But when researchers want to stress mice, they pinch their tails. The first thing the mice do? Run to their food bowls and eat. It’s a beta-endorphin thing. Beta-endorphin is released in response to either pleasure or pain/distress and beta-endorphin increases appetite.
Have any of your students ever complained that they gain weight when they’re stressed? Did you believe them? Did you think they were just blaming stress to avoid taking responsibility for indulging in high-calorie foods?
Well, when the stressed and overeating mice are given a choice between ordinary mouse chow and crumbled cookies, which do you think they choose? Yes, cookies — another beta-endorphin thing. Released beta-endorphin makes endorphin-triggering foods — like sugar or fat — more appealing. So, since stressed mice do what we do under the same circumstances, maybe we can sympathize with our students who gain weight under stress.
Of course, with people it’s more complex. Those who are highly susceptible to the effects of beta-endorphin may react to stress by eating. For others, though, short-term stress decreases appetite. Having to make an important early morning presentation at work could bring on a stress chemical cascade that leads to skipping breakfast. Once the presentation is done, a different hormone — cortisol — takes over and increases appetite. Lunch that day might make up for the skipped breakfast, and then some.
In long-term stress, cortisol plays a more prominent role. Its appetite-stimulating effect lingers. It decreases serotonin, which can cause anxiety or depression. Those mood states in turn cause cravings — mostly for carbs and, of course, not for healthful ones. Low serotonin also reduces satiety (especially for carbs) and increases impulsivity, making it more likely that we’ll eat the junky carbs we’re craving.
Long-term high cortisol levels also decrease dopamine and norepinephrine. When serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine drop, it leads not only to cravings, but to addictions, impulsive and compulsive behaviors, and a preference for carbs and sugars.
Over time, cortisol can decrease beta-endorphin. Chronically low beta-endorphin increases the risk for addictive or compulsive behaviors, including alcoholism, bulimia, binge eating, and more.
None of this even touches on the metabolic problems caused by cortisol. Fat deposits in the trunk, the more “metabolically harmful” location. Too much cortisol can cause glucose disturbances and even insulin resistance. Insulin resistance can lead to type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, high triglycerides, low HDL cholesterol (the good stuff), and high or dense LDL (the bad stuff, which is worse when dense). Insulin resistance also causes plaque formation in the arteries, heart disease, various types of cancer, and more.
Obviously, long-term stress leads to serious consequences in health, metabolism and appetite. So it might not be the student’s fault for running to the food bowl and eating the cookies, but, health-wise, it’s far from ideal.
Fortunately, in addition to meditation, deep breathing, visualization and the like, there are nutrition solutions for stress management. (You knew they were coming.)
It’s understandable that a stressed-out student might want a martini or a dish of chocolate ice cream, but succumbing to that urge will probably backfire. Stress depletes B vitamins, which are critical in the formation of key brain chemicals. Alcohol — the go-to stress-reliever for some — also destroys B vitamins and makes it more difficult to “stabilize” brain chemicals. Avoiding alcohol may feel tough to do under stress but helps far more than drinking will.
In addition, long-term alcohol or sugar consumption will eventually decrease serotonin and beta-endorphin, resulting in rotten moods and major cravings. So staying away from sugar will help, too.
Instead, encourage the student to eat protein foods throughout the day to supply the amino acid precursors for serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine.
Also encourage the student to get B vitamins for good brain function. Specific B vitamins that we need for neurochemical balance include thiamin, found in whole grains and meats; B6, found in whole grains, eggs, chicken, fish and liver; and folic acid, found in leafy greens and liver.
Naturally, encourage the student to keep taking your cycling classes as often as possible for the stress relief they provide. Cycling also reduces the likelihood of insulin resistance by making muscles more responsive to insulin, which is always a good thing. If the calories burned help prevent weight gain, that’s another plus.
[plulz_social_like width=”350″ send=”false” font=”arial” action=”like” layout=”standard” faces=”false” ]
by John | Jul 14, 2012 | Instructor Training, Master Instructor Blog, Training With Power
For many (me included), the biggest appeal of spectator sports like motorcycle racing or watching the Tour de France is projecting yourself into the event as one of the participants. Having road raced motorcycles for years, I know intimately the continuous sound of an engine at redline… what it's like to hang off the side of the motorcycle at over 100 miles an hour… the rush of adrenaline as my knee scrapes the asphalt. So it's easy for me to let my mind drift and fantasize that I could make starting grid for a MotoGP race, from the comfort and safety of my couch at home.
Same is true for me when it comes to bicycle racing, especially while watching the tour each July. I can hear commentator Paul Sherwen describe my break from the front as I power up the road, intent on bridging to the breakaway; “Macgowan as made his move, as we knew he would… He's definitely saved just a little bit in his tank for this final climb… this will be an exciting finish Phil!”
Could I really ride with the Tour? Not hardly. I've ridden and raced with people who could simply ride away from me with little or no perceived additional effort. And these people were certainly not able to make the starting roster for a professional cycling team. I'm guessing that few of the cyclists is I've ridden with, the ones who really impressed me with their strength/speed/endurance, could even hang with the professional team on their recovery days.
In the past my comparisons were based on direct experience (typically getting dropped) or simple perception. Now, with the availability of power indication in our classes, I can compare my power output (watts) with that of a professional cyclist and know with certainty how quickly I'll be dropped 🙁
They say that the beauty of using metrics in training is that; if you can measure it – you can improve it. But metric's also provide a tangible point of comparison we can use to compare ourselves to others.
I talk a lot about the 1 watt per pound concept that Gene Nacey uses to decide whether or not you're ready to go out and start climbing hills. Gene says ” One watt per pound is the gateway to outdoor riding.” Where Gene lives in Pittsburgh it's very hilly. Long climbs don't exist here in the flat-lands of Minnesota. So I like to discuss a second metric in my classes; what's your sustainable flat road speed? Or based on your sustainable wattage, what speed would you be riding outdoors?
This website has a fantastic tool for computing sustainable flat road speed, based on your individual (male or female) power output. It also has a fun chart where you can compare yourself to cyclists who race in the various categories; Cat 5 – Cat1 – all the way up to professionals.
You enter your body weight in Lbs and your Threshold Power in Watts. I know I can sustain 250 watts on a FreeMotion Indoor Cycle and I weigh 160 lbs. Here is my result.
I believe ~23.82 mph is quite close. I dug back into my records and saw my average speed for the bike leg of the Apple Duathlon was right at 23 mph. This 33k race course is dead flat. I raced it three times, partnering with my neighbor Mark who did the runs. The comparison chart shows me as a Cat 4, which was the highest I ever raced.
So how would I compare to a time trial ridden by a professional? Because the length and course of the individual time trials in the Tour De France change every year, there's some debate as to who had the fastest average speed. Local boy Greg LeMond (he's from Minnesota) in 1989 and David Zabriskie (2005) both won individual time trial stages averaging ~34 miles an hour.
Here's how much power they needed to not only produce, but sustain for nearly 60 minutes:
Assuming they both weighed 160 Lbs, Greg and David needed to double my wattage to ride 50% faster than me… astounding!
Go over to the calculator and see where your power falls and which category you would race. And if you're brave, add your results below.
by John | Jul 10, 2012 | Big Box Instructor, Instructor Training, Master Instructor Blog
“It's gorgeous outside, why are you here?”
“Your class is a lot more efficient workout for me, than riding outdoors.”
My question was directed at my class in general, but I was looking at Jim, a buddy of mine when I said it. Jim is a member of what I called the A-Team, the regular participants to my Monday 5:45AM class. Jim is a typical A-type personality; a high-powered attorney who has more money than time. If you spend a few minutes talking to him you'd realize he's pretty much a no-nonsense guy and I'm guessing Jim had some court date or other appointment that morning. Otherwise he would normally be out on his bike.
Are your students looking for efficiency in your class?
I'm going to start by suggesting that the time of day your class occurs attracts a specific type of person:
- Early morning classes, in my opinion, are filled with people looking for efficiency. Like my friend Jim they want to go in, work out and get off to work at a set time. We (I'm including myself in this A-Team) are very structured in our schedules. Every Monday morning as I leave the club I hold the door for another friend, Dr Block, who's just arriving to the club… every Monday this happens without fail.
- Midmorning classes tend to be social events, attracting a large number of women… which is why many of us call these housewives classes.
- Noon classes are back to efficiency… Students want to get in and out within the prescribed length of time.
- Evening classes seem to be a hybrid of both efficiency and social. If you teach evening classes you may recognize members who appear to have nowhere else to go at the end of the day… and those who blast off 10 seconds after the end.
So if you're teaching either early morning, or noon classes I feel it's important that you recognize your student's need for efficiency and deliver on it.
Here are a few suggestions from a habitual early a.m. Instructor:
- Start on time. I've been in a lot of morning classes where it's obvious the instructor is expecting a number of late arrivals. Teach to everyone who's there on time!
- Demonstrate discipline as the Instructor. People looking for efficiency tend to be well organized themselves. If you are stumbling around, with no clear sense of direction, you'll frustrate your students.
- Keep your communication clear and concise. As I discussed in an earlier post where the microphone had quit early in class, because I had already laid out the class plan students new exactly what to do.
- Encourage early arrivers to lead themselves through a self-directed warm-up.
- Minimize the duration of your planned warm-up. I'm not suggesting you yell GO! at 5:46 am and then pound them for the next 60 min. But rather impress upon everyone, in the spirit of efficiency, to increase their work-load as quickly as they can comfortably do so.
- Teach long efforts near threshold. My experience is that people want to feel that they've time in class has been productive, but not feel trashed at the end of an early a.m. class. Despite everyone's best efforts, we're still warming up 30 min. into class. Long efforts give your students a chance to adapt, as their bodies allow.
- Minimize recovery between efforts. I rarely take my students above threshold in the morning class… but I may keep them just below it for 20 or more minute. I'll described it as riding in your Performance Zone â„¢ where I encourage students work as hard as they comfortable, for the specified length of time.
- Discourage the chatter. Efficient people do not appreciate distractions, while they are focused on a task. Believe me, many of the your students look at their participation in your class as a task to be completed within the specified length of time. Long efforts up near threshold, with minimal recoveries in between, will keep most everyone focused and above the Chatty Zoneâ„¢.
Did I miss anything [wlm_firstname]?
by Jim Karanas | Jul 2, 2012 | Master Instructor Blog
In the future we can have Rosie sub for us.
By Team ICG® Master Trainer Jim Karanas
Every day, countless products, services, and people provide us with positive or negative experiences. Not long ago, one of my students confronted me to let me know that she was annoyed and frustrated with a substitute instructor I had used for a recent class.
Now, substitute cycling instructors are often well-trained, decent instructors. But however good the sub may be, he/she is not the instructor for whom he/she is subbing. As we all know, indoor cycling students grow attached to their instructors, especially their favorite ones, and are critical of whoever comes in to sub that favorite’s class.
For 30 years, I was a program director in commercial clubs. Instructors sub out an average of 15% of their classes every month. A club that offers 20 cycling classes per week has a monthly schedule of about 87 classes. Taking 15% of 87, we can estimate that 13 classes per month are subbed. At $35 per hour, that works out to $456.75 a month or $5,481.00 per year spent on subs. Multiply that by 20 clubs.
If the students don’t enjoy the class, that’s a lot of money spent on a negative member experience.
The question is whether the cycling-instructor substitute provides a level of service that’s beneficial for the club owner and a sufficiently positive member experience for the cost. Of course, there are exceptions, but consider the market as a whole. How valuable is the current instructor-sub system that’s in place in most clubs? Could it be replaced or enhanced in any way?
My experience in the industry tells me that having an instructor in the room may be necessary for safety reasons. The substitute process is also a great way to check out and train new instructors. Yet, when you look at the cost, the aggravation and time spent dealing with subs, and poor member experiences, is the current system the best solution? Does it remain so in light of current technological advancements?
If you’ve read my posts, you know that my position regarding the use of video and virtual programming in the club setting is very positive. The production of virtual programming for indoor-cycling classes is accelerating and improving. I don’t believe that video will ever replace a quality instructor. But I do feel that a well-constructed video profile can do the job that many substitute instructors are doing. It could certainly leave a more positive impression on the students.
One of the reasons for this has to do with a change in expectation. An indoor-cycling student who sees that the class will be taught by a virtual coach has a completely different attitude about the situation. A sub will inevitably be compared to the favorite instructor, but no one could reasonably expect a virtual class to be as good as, or even similar to, the favorite class.
This “forced” opening of the mind almost guarantees greater satisfaction — or, at the very least, less dissatisfaction. The student’s mind has to go in a new direction altogether. The student will walk away thinking different thoughts. Thoughts like: I liked it. I didn’t like it. That was interesting. It was OK, but “real” instruction is better. That was kinda fun for a change. I can’t wait till ___ gets back.
At least these are a far cry from, “I hated the sub and won’t go to any class she/he teaches anymore.” Or “What a crummy way to start my day.” Or “Why can’t my favorite instructor find better subs?”
So we should still retain subs, but what if they were used in more specific contexts, when video just won’t do? Would this not ease the struggle of the indoor-cycling director, as well as save money for the club owner? Would it not reduce negative member experiences?
Teaching indoor cycling is my occupation and my craft. The time I spend preparing for it and doing it is equaled by some, not equaled by others, and disregarded by still others. My point is not that video is better than a live instructor, but that each sub prepares differently, is liked or disliked by individual students, and will be compared (typically unfavorably) to the regular instructor. If a well-done video can provide a good, solid class that is met with a better attitude for the reasons described above, wouldn’t that make it a better solution to the “subbing problem”?
I hope this topic generates some discussion. I’m interested in your thoughts and feelings. I see this as a real and viable possibility for the future.
