This is the view from the Cycling Studio at Couples Tower Isle in Jamaica! It's one of 65 tropical resorts where our Grand Prize Winner can spend a romantic week 🙂
Today begins the start of the Ultimate Instructor Class Profile Contest part deux!
The Grand Prize winner will receive All-Inclusive accommodations on a working fitness vacation, at any of the 65 Caribbean Resorts available at FitnessProTravel.com + $500 cash from Master Trainer Jim Karanas with Team ICG®  that you can apply toward your plane tickets!
To help our PRO members get excited about entering and creating their own ultimate class profile, I invited Krista Leopold – of Welcome to the Jungle Audio PROfile fame – to help us learn how she creates:
Unforgettable Rides:Â 3 Steps to Creating the Ultimate Instructor Class Profile that Riders Remember
Many of us already do things like plan for holidays or use events to theme our rides, such as the Tour de France or the Olympics.  But you don't have to wait for something on the calendar to impact your students. Today, we are going to take a basic profile and give it a makeover. In the end we will be left with something that makes our students say “WOW. That was incredible!” My goal is to provide you with a game plan to bring some bling to your old profiles. I am going to walk you through the steps I take to transform a basic profile into an experience your riders will want more of!
This Audio PROfile from Team ICG® Master Trainer Jim Karanas may completely change how you teach… but only if you're open to the challenge to adding some movement to your class.
If you are a straight-up indoor-cycling instructor, and/or a roadie, you are likely never going to attempt to teach a Mountain Rider class. However, if you enjoy the trail as much, or even more than, the road, then I hope these ideas will help you bring the trail to your students.
I recently offered Mountain Rider for the first time in North America at Can Fit Pro in Toronto. I was amazed at how many instructors attended class because (a) they ride off-road, and (b) they wanted the experience of riding off-road. Some were roadies who were actually concerned about their lack of off-road skills — as if I was going to ask them to bunny-hop a log.
Some basic class suggestions will set the stage:
1. Tell your class participants that, for today, they must forget much of what you’ve previously taught them about indoor cycling.
2. Mountain biking does work with energy zones, power, intervals and threshold, but pure, senseless fun needs to be a major part of the class design.
3. Simulation begins with education. Teach them about the trail. Are we on a fire trail or single track? What’s the surface? What are the conditions? In mountain biking, the trail surface and conditions change the experience completely. This needs to be part of your cueing.
4. Introduce and use off-road terminology: fire roads, single track, rollers, washboards, high-side/low-side.
Download the complete Mountain Rider presentation PDF here.
NOTE: To access the videos referenced by Jim – please create a FREE account at http://www.ic-pro.org/en Then, once you are logged in, you can click the link to view the videos – links to each is in the PDF.
Many respondents to the ICI/PRO member survey asked that these Audio PROfiles have additional detail. Let me know if Jim's PROfile has what you were asking for [wlm_firstname].
Come and ride the culmination of 3 days of training in the French alps by knocking down a climbers dream. Four distinct climbs, with the two finishers on the exact road ridden by the Tour de France just 2 days after this DVD was filmed on the Columbiere.
OBJECTIVE AND INTENSITY
The focus and objective of this ride is to still have something left in our legs and body to ride strong on the last climb up the Col de la Columbiere. Consistent with the preceding climb up the Col des Aravis, our goal will be to both manage our ability to ride in Zone 3 (75-80%) and Zone 4 (80-90%) and develop and test our muscular endurance.
Tom's recommendation is to use the music included with the DVD.
Listen to Tom's presentation below or you will find it in your ICI/PRO Member feed in iTunes – You can view a tutorial video about setting up your “Super Secret iTunes Feed” here.
Spinning Instructor Amy Pillitteri – Beth Anne Gordley Photography
Meet Spinning Instructor Amy Pillitteri!
Amy is the runner-up in our Ultimate Instructor Class Profile contest!
About Waldo’s Revenge
I wrote this profile for a group of students I was working with during a winter and spring periodization program at a nearby YMCA this year. This particular class was full of enthusiastic triathletes and cyclists training for the Waldo County YMCA Triathlon Festival. We worked through all the various phases of the program leading up to the outdoor season. When it came time to re-test for lactate threshold, nobody really wanted to break away from his or her training regimen. So, in lieu of a field test, I put together a mock time trial, which mimicked the actual race. I encouraged the athletes to take their average heart rate, to see if they were race ready. This is how I came up with Waldo’s Revenge!
Having ridden and raced the course myself dozens of times, it was easy to coach it in class. Writing it in a profile, well that’s another story. I can tell you first hand, though, that it’s a really fun and challenging ride. The terrain in Maine is absolutely splendid. We have beautiful tree-lined roads, which run along the rocky coastline, and twist around the picturesque mountains, hills, lakes, and ponds. The wind, as in many time trials, is the big limiting factor on this course. Some of my really strong students wrote race reports after the triathlon this year, and I have included some of their remarks for fun. These comments will, hopefully, provide more insight, as to what’s going on inside an athlete’s mind during the race.
The Ultimate Instructor Class Profile contest winner Allison Santoro
Here's the Grand Prize winning entry to our Ultimate Instructor Class Profile Contest from Instructor Allison Santoro!
Profile Description
Today we will test the law of gravity…what goes up, must come down. Whiteface Mountain is a very challenging 8-mile climb up to a castle at the summit of the mountain. As you approach a toll-house at the three-mile mark, you will be mentally preparing for the most challenging part of this ride with 8% to 10% gradients for several miles. As you ascend to the summit, two switchbacks and an ease in grade will provide you with the perfect opportunity to enjoy the rush of powering-through your threshold to the summit. At the summit, you will surrender to gravity…and be rewarded with an exhilarating 10-minute down-hill recovery.
Instructor Profile – Allison Santoro
I became a certified indoor cycling instructor, after spinning for fitness and leisure since the early 1990s.
As a student, I noticed that there were a wide range of teaching practices and styles, and many instructors were quite obviously not qualified to be teaching an indoor cycling class. Frankly, some classes were so bad, it’s a miracle that I still have my knees and back intact.
Anyway, I decided to take my Spinning® certification so that I could establish myself as a knowledgeable instructor that could provide constructive coaching on performance, technique and safety.
I currently teach a lunchtime indoor cycling class at Fitcorp at the Prudential Center in Boston. I also teach the occasional weekend class in New Hampshire, where I live.
I met my husband and best friend Al, over 20 years ago, and we’ve been married for 7 years. We live in New Hampshire on the seacoast, which is about 50 miles north of Boston, where I work.
Funnily enough, it was my husband’s love of cycling that prompted me to buy a road-bike and venture outdoors. I was quickly hooked on cycling outdoors, and before I knew it, Al and I were signing up for century rides, and I even did the Boston to New York aids ride a couple of times.
When I’m not cycling, instructing, or working, I like all things outdoors — especially golf. I started playing golf a couple of years ago, and like cycling, I was immediately hooked. Allison@AllAboutAlly.com
Congratulations Allison – your class profile is truly the Ultimate!
Note: We'll be running this contest again, between September 15th and ending on October 31st. I've already secured a number of fabulous prizes (think: teaching somewhere warm) so you may want to start thinking about what you will submitting this Fall 🙂
