In the past, if you wanted to earn a Heart Zones Certification you needed to attend a live conference or workshop. Not any longer… now you can attend online 🙂
Cycling Fusion is hosting a live Heart Zones Level 2 Certification on September 22nd. The presenters of this training are Tom Scotto and Sally Edwards. CECs for most national certifications and you can petition Spinning for their acceptance You can learn more and reserve spot here.
Note: this event is long past, but you can earn your certification using the recorded educational content. Click here to learn more.
The beauty of participating in this certification online (and may make an online certification superior to a live event) is that everything will be recorded and available for you to review for up to 6 months. Also, if you can't devote the entire day you can watch the recordings at a later date.
NOTE: If you are reading this after September 22nd 2012 you can earn this certification by reviewing all the recorded materials.
Tom and I discuss the specifics in this episode of the Indoor Cycle Instructor Podcast.
One of the best things about the Olympics is that it provides an ideal. We rejoice in being human. Even if we don’t exercise or have never done athletics, “stronger, faster, higher” makes sense. This became even truer with the inclusion of Oscar Pistorius (aka Blade Runner) in the Track and Field competition. The masses that watch and support the Olympics show no ego in that regard.
We believe there’s a reason for this. What it takes to become an Olympian is well advertised. Family, friends and businesses feel compelled to support the dedication these young people show for what they love to do. Because so many “ordinary” people play a role in getting the athlete to the Olympics, and because the athlete receives no financial benefit for the performance, we feel included.
Some great ads during the Olympics featured Morgan Freeman’s voice stating, “Before they got here, WE had to move them.”
ICG® wants to keep the fire going. Supporting our young trainers and instructors directly parallels the kind of support the Olympic athlete requires.
I’ve been a trainer/instructor for over 30 years. Everyone says they wish they had my job: I exercise, wear comfortable clothes, go to fun places and work with upbeat people. I also have less money for retirement and fewer assets than most people my age who have worked 30 years in a single, but different, industry.
I’ve spent a lot of time, money and effort becoming a good indoor-cycling instructor, and I’ll never regret it. I love to train. I love to show others how to train. I get to talk to people all day long about how great it is to ride a bike. I listen to music, watch forward-motion video, and travel to beautiful places to ride my bike, indoors and out.
I‘m happy to see more and more club companies providing employment opportunities with benefits for their instructors. Yet, overall, the industry is still lacking. I know many talented instructors who have left fitness because they couldn’t earn an adequate living to support their families.
Our industry needs dedicated instructors who are full-timers in attitude and caring, whether they work full- or part-time hours. To be effective in training someone in the second half of his/her life requires experience and maturity. Our future instructors must be dedicated professionals who take joy in their work, do it for life, and can earn the money necessary to support a family. Even send their kids to the Olympics, if that’s a possibility.
We at ICG® have looked at what we need to do to inspire the next generation of instructors. We take responsibility for supporting these young individuals who want to do what we do for the sheer love of training by giving away over one million dollars of accredited indoor-cycling certifications and continuing education for FREE. We believe that “Personal Bests are not just for athletes.”
To be a great indoor-cycling instructor, you must study as well as ride. You must dedicate yourself and commit to your craft. ICG® Master Trainer Chuck Cali is publishing an article later this week on “Improving Your Craft”. Become your best by taking time to read and learn, and then putting into practice, what ICG’s seasoned instructors and education specialists have created for the indoor-cycling industry.
ICG is offering the next 1000 new Team ICG® Members — and providing all its existing members with — our internationally accredited ICG® STAGES Online certification 100% free. This industry donation of over $1M is made knowing that, as we help you set new Personal Bests as teachers, you will help the generation of today — and the generation of tomorrow — set theirs, too. This is a worldwide offer.
We challenge our competitors to match our contribution and find ways that they, too, can inspire and deliver lasting benefits for future generations.
Club Owners, Providers, Instructors, Riders: Be Your Own Hero®.
Not an ICI/PRO conference but maybe the next best thing.
Heart Zones and Cycling Fusion have teamed up to create TrainDifferent – what I believe is the very first fitness conference / workshop that offers you three different ways you can attend.
CONFERENCE CENTER LIVE: From Oakmont, near Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania at our Cycling Fusion Training Center, this will be the live conference that will be web-broadcast to the Official Host Sites as well as to the At Home participants. You will be participating and part of the televised audience.
OFFICIAL HOST SITES: Locations across the USA are joining the Conference remotely with a combination of live instructors as well as web-simulcast. This is the best of both using the net and having certified instructors providing you with hands-on learning opportunities. Your workouts will be led by a CHZT, Certified Heart Zones Trainer for the workouts and the keynote lectures and party will be a web simulcast. There are still openings for additional Official Host Sites. Contact Sally Edwards for more information on adding your club or studio.
AT HOME: Participate from your home or any place that has an internet connection. You can attend the Conference as it's happening or watch up to the next 30-days at a time and a place you choose.
HEART ZONES CONFERENCE FACULTY
Sally Edwards, MA, MBA, is one of America's leading experts in business, exercise science, and lifestyle living. In 1993, she created HZT, the Heart Zones Training patented and branded training system and in 2010 she launched the new ZONING Fitness program and brand. Sally, 65 years old, is a professional triathlete finishing over 200 raes and ultra-marathon running champion. She is an author of two dozen books including the popular Heart Rate Monitor Guidebook, the definitive source on heart-rate based training. She is the founder of the Fleet Feet Sports retail stores. Sally is a professional speaker and as she has for the past 22 years, she continues as the national spokeswoman for the Danskin Womens Triathlon Series.
Gene Nacey, MPH holds 2 bachelor degrees and a masters degree in Public Health. A former entrepreneur of the year, Gene spent 20 years building a technology business before his passion for fitness lead him to become a fitness studio owner. His company has licensed the rights to be the official cycling program for Heart Zones as Cycling Fusion. Gene is a certified USA Cycling coach and one of America's premier fitness experts with a specialty in using heart rate and power data for improved cycling. He is the author of the popular ebook Power Training .
Carl Foster, Ph. D. is a Professor of Exercise and Sport Science at the University of Wisconsin in La Crosse. He is the co-author of Be a Better Runner, and is a renowned researcher with over 300 published scientific papers to his credit. For the last 20 years he has served as a consultant, faculty member and friend of Heart Zones USA, the training and education company. He continues in that role with the company's new division, ZONING Fitness, asuring that all activity protocols are safe, research-based, and appropriate for individuals.
Where to Attend? Official Host Sites of the remote broadcast are in the following areas: Peachtree City (Atlanta), GA; Bellevue (Seattle), WA; Boston, MA; Lakewood (Denver), CO; San Francisco, CA; Milwaukee, WI; New York City, NY; Rochester, NY; and Oakmont (Pittsburgh) PA. More locations will likely be announced, too! Specific site details are presented below.
All the information on CECs, locations, times and delayed broadcasts options is available here.
With both our kids out of the house and in college, Amy and I have talked about potentially moving somewhere else. The idea of living in a new location has a lot of appeal to me, after spending the majority of my life in the frozen northlands of Minnesota.
To paraphrase the saying; “go big or go home” in weightlifting… why not; “go far or stay home?” As in moving to another country, like say the UK?
I'm not sure if that would be possible (or acceptable to my two daughters) but if I did move to to the UK, what would it take to get certified so I could teach in London or some other British city?
I thought it would be fun to find out, so I contacted Doyle Armstrong who's the Program Director with the Indoor Cycling Group (and lives in the UK) to help me understand what's required to get my REPs certification – the equivalent of ACE here in the USA .
The Register of Exercise Professionals (REPs) is the independant public register which recognises the qualifications and expertise of exercise and fitness professionals in the UK.
Membership of REPs provides assurance and confidence to consumers, employers and health care professionals that all REPs registered exercise and fitness professionals are appropriately qualified and have the knowledge, competence and skills to perform specific roles.
If you have a question for Doyle you can leave it below or post it on the Team ICG Facebook page.
Listen below as Doyle explains the REPs certification process in the latest episode of the Indoor Cycle Instructor Podcast.
“Where can I get certified as an Indoor Cycling Instructor?” It's a question we get at least 10 times a month. My answer has typically been to check with the club or studio to find out their requirements. Many want a specific certification. Spinning® facilities will tell you that you need a Spinning certification, clubs with Keiser M3 cycles will probably want you to understand teaching with power, etc…
So you follow my advice and meet with the owner of your local studio. You explain that you would like to apply as an Instructor and teach classes there. What do you do when she tells you that you just need a certification, nothing specific, just something saying you are certified?
So you run home and Google: Indoor Cycling Certification and you see this advertised listing in the search results.
First they may want to enhance their spelling skills
Please don't waste you time or money getting this “certification” from the ASFA – American Sport and Fitness Association.
All you have to do is answer 75 questions and pay them $99.00 for your one year “certification”. Add an extra $26.00 and they throw in a Pocket Certification Card – what no secret decoder ring? You can forgo the need for any continuing education by paying a total of $299.00 for Life Time Renewals 🙂
The test took me a whole 5 minutes and includes a bunch on nonsense questions that anyone without a shoe fetish can easily pass.
Once you are certified you should become an ICI/PRO member to supplement your education. The awesome class profiles we publish every month – over 45 profile are available to members today. We offer everything you need to be a rock star instructor 🙂
Here's an interesting story about how the the ASFA is viewed by the Better Business Bureau.
Kim States, BBB President, said it would be one thing if people were simply using the certificates as gag novelties, to show off to friends and family. But an Internet search shows trainers using their ASFA certificates on their public resumes to solicit business. “For people to tell consumers they are ASFA certified is simply misleading,” she said. “An ASFA certificate should have about as much credibility as a three-dollar bill.”
