Nowadays I’m hugely passionate about indoor cycling, but 20 years ago I came at things from a design perspective. I used to work in the furniture industry, and prior to that had been involved in the design of other products too, from textiles to fashion accessories and glasses. Design has always been my first love and forte. 

“We believe even the best can always be better. We’re constantly creating, which is what makes my job fun”

At the time, the model was the BODY BIKE Classic. I was fascinated by its quality, but believed a few design changes could make it even better. That included fully enclosing the bike to protect all vital parts from sweat, making it even more long-lasting – an attribute BODY BIKE has always been famous for.

Since then, we’ve continued to push the design boundaries in pursuit of the perfect indoor bike. We believe even the best can always be better – an ethos that’s kept me enthused and engaged over my two decades at BODY BIKE. We’re constantly creating, which is what makes my job fun.

What’s driven your product evolution?

We’ve always given ourselves permission to innovate and experiment at BODY BIKE, which is ultimately what drives our product evolution.

But in terms of key themes over the years, I’d have to spotlight technology and sustainability – both things we couldn’t have predicted 20 years ago.

Back then, cycling classes were screen-free. Now there’s an interest in performance data, so in 2016 we launched the BODY BIKE app; we’ve never believed consoles to be the best approach, as we believe riders should own their own data.

“We’re on a mission to make all our models sustainable, using recycled materials and reducing each bike’s CO2 footprint.”

Meanwhile, sustainability has become a mantra at BODY BIKE. Our sustainable BODY BIKE Smart+ siblings – OceanIX and Forest Green – blazed such a strong trail that we’re now on a mission to make all our models sustainable, using recycled materials in their manufacture and working to further reduce each bike’s already-low CO2 footprint.

And now, in 2024, we’re about to unveil our latest evolution: the new BODY BIKE Phantom, which launches at FIBO next month. With its magnetic braking system, Quattro resistance knob – four clicks per turn for precise gear changes – and inbuilt usage tracking so clubs can rotate bikes for even greater longevity, this fantastic new model continues to move the dial for riders and operators alike.

Has the company changed much?

The ethos and philosophy at BODY BIKE are essentially unchanged from 27 years ago. Each bike is still lovingly hand-crafted in Denmark, with quality, creativity and passion at the heart of what we do. The team is also only 20 per cent larger than it was at the beginning, with great continuity over the years. BODY BIKE was founded in 1997 by Jørgen ‘Peiter’ Petersen, who remained a mentor and brand enthusiast until he passed away in 2017. It is now led by his son Kim Hessellund, who joined the business in 1999. There’s a real sense of family, with several team members with us from the very beginning.

But we have grown and evolved, of course. We now wholly own a 12,000sq m factory in the north of Denmark, including on-site metalworks, and you’ll find our bikes in all corners of the world. In fact, although we’re proudly Danish and have a strong local fan base, 80 per cent of our production is now exported. We also launched BODY BIKE APAC last year: our first investment in establishing our company overseas rather than using local distributors.

Where else does your creativity shine?

We’ve become magazine publishers, launching RIDE HIGH in 2017 – a brand-neutral publication that champions and celebrates indoor cycling around the world. Anyone can promote their own products. I really wanted to bring something to the table that would inspire our whole sector on to even greater things. I’m hugely proud of what RIDE HIGH has become –the fascinating people we’ve interviewed and the great insights and perspectives we’ve shared.

“I wanted to bring something to the table that would inspire our whole sector on to even greater things. I’m hugely proud of RIDE HIGH.”

We have a lot of fun with our FIBO stands too: from spaceships to forests, we create out-of-the-ordinary, crowd-drawing spaces.

And in 2021, we launched BBCARGO: a sister brand to BODY BIKE. This best-in-class eCargo bike puts all our sustainability learnings and bike-building expertise to good use. It just felt like the right thing to do given all the environmental pressures on the world around us.

How has indoor cycling changed?

The arrival of the boutiques was a big one. These beautiful spaces, with their rockstar instructors and incredible music and light shows, took riders into another world, while ‘dancing on a bike’ programming brought a new element of fun to indoor cycling. All of this has driven a dramatic change in consumer expectations, forcing other operators to up their game.

We’ve also seen the diversification of programming generally. From the old days of fitness cycling to generic music, we now have everything from on-the-beat choreography to performance classes and everything in between. There’s something for everyone.

I’ve mentioned technology already, but its impact goes far beyond data. From spectacular AV to wraparound screens, the rise of immersive experiences has been transformational for our sector. I remember the first time I tried Les Mills’ THE TRIP. I had goosebumps. 

It was a privilege to supply BODY BIKES for the global roadshow that introduced THE TRIP to the world. In fact, I’d highlight our strong, long-standing relationship with Les Mills as one of the highlights of my time at BODY BIKE.

What’s the future of indoor cycling?

Right now, indoor cycling isn’t as hot as it has previously been: reformer pilates is the big trend at the moment. I firmly believe indoor cycling is here to stay, though. It’s arguably unique in the way it caters for all ages and abilities in one class, and it has and will continue to stand the test of time – provided it evolves in line with consumer expectations.

In many cases, operators cutting back on indoor cycling – quoting reduced member interest – are in this position because they haven’t invested in creating experiences. It’s understandable, so I’m not criticising: the last few years have been incredibly hard for everyone. But now, as investment budgets finally return, it’s time to upgrade spaces, equipment, technology and most of all instructors. My simple advice: hire the people who will fill the room.

“In many cases, operators cutting back on indoor cycling – quoting reduced member interest – haven’t invested in creating experiences”

The post Uffe A Olesen appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

This free-to-use app functions as a training companion, helping users train smarter and providing instructors with a large, high-quality workout catalogue they can help grow.

More than 50,000 workouts on the platform include Intelligent Cycling’s own official rides, plus workouts by BODY BIKE, Keiser, Wattbike, Schwinn and other industry leaders, as well as users.

Track your progress in the app using your performance score and workout history, embrace the newly-added social dimension – like, follow and share your favourite creators – and use expansive new search filters to easily find your perfect workout: Spotify vs no playlist, official vs user workouts, duration, intensity and so on.

The mobile app can also be paired with a desktop app to enhance the in-studio experience.

intelligent-cycling.com

Ciclozone

A multilingual app created by former pro cyclist Darren Teagles who – finding himself involved in fitness industry education and disillusioned by the level of indoor cycle training concepts – decided to create his own.

“Ciclozone harvests the best cycle science and professional cycle training knowledge and harnesses it within the standard indoor cycle format,” he says.

AI-based algorithms understand your power levels and constantly adjust as you train, recommending new workouts based on previous performance.

Able to connect to RPM and power sensors on bikes and cycle trainers, as well as heart rate devices, the app has a proprietary data value – Ciclozone Output Level% – that constantly guides you in every element of your ride to help you continually improve.

ciclozone.com

Motosumo

Free to use for gyms, instructors and members, Motosumo’s smartphone app connects to any make or model of stationary bike to unlock an engaging, data-driven experience, however entry-level the bike.

On a smart bike, it connects via Bluetooth: the bike’s sensors send data to the app. On other bikes, the phone sits on the handlebars and accurately translates vibrations from the bike into cadence, distance and calories. Additional data can be drawn in by connecting to an external heart rate monitor or power meter.

Motosumo also connects bikes and riders into shared social experiences in-studio or via livestream: create a group, invite people to join and take part in real-time rides together. Instructors can interact with participants via polls and emojis.

motosumo.com

Myzone

Cycling with Myzone means connected fitness experiences powered by personal effort, accurate heart rate (HR) tracking and real-time feedback.

The free Myzone app offers workouts, challenge incentives and a like-minded, motivational community. Colour-coded heart rate zone tiles on your smartphone screen push you towards your goals and educate around recovery.

Recently launched are three new premium elements: MZ-Club, MZ-Together and MZ-On Demand. MZ-On Demand unlocks 1,300 pre-recorded classes – including virtual rides – while MZ-Club allows facilities to broadcast their own content to exercisers everywhere.

With MZ-Together, exercisers just need the Myzone app and HR monitor to take part in live classes such as Cardio Club, where – coached live by a Myzone master trainer – they participate however they choose, from jumping on an indoor bike to going outside for a run.

myzone.org

The Breakaway

Founded in 2020 by Jordan Kobert and Kyle Yugawa, both early Strava leaders, and former professional cyclist Christian Vande Velde, The Breakaway is a connected training app for cyclists – a personal coach in your pocket.

Designed to easily track progress and improvement in indoor cycling, The Breakaway now covers outdoor cycling too, but still with a strong focus on the work you can do indoors.

It makes it simple to understand where you are as an athlete – with benchmarks for age, gender and weight across 12 power skills – then offers ride and workout recommendations, and expert Q&As, to help you achieve peak performance more often. 

For Peloton, it can even send recommended workouts to the bike so they’re bookmarked and ready for you, and gather data from your workouts to set personalised weekly targets.

breakaway.app

W3RIDE

W3RIDE is a new app inspired by the concept of Air Miles: a reward system for cyclists that engages and encourages people to cycle more often.

It integrates with and draws workout data from Strava, Polar, Suunto, Komoot and more, with indoor cycling integrations due to launch based on heart rate and power. The app converts this workout data into points that can be used in the app in a number of ways: to secure discounts from partner brands including Nike, Oakley and Garmin; to buy entry into in-app charity events; or simply to donate to charity, with sponsors turning the points into cash.

Points can also unlock premium upgrades in the app – for example, better virtual bikes for your avatar that earn you more points for each ride completed.

w3ride.io

Spivi

Predominantly a studio-based solution that draws on wearables, equipment and sensors in the club to track performance data and gamify members’ fitness journeys – with avatars and animation, live leaderboards, challenges, milestones, points and awards – Spivi also offers a couple of complementary apps.

Spivi.Connect can be installed on your Apple Watch or Android device, allowing you to stream your heart rate data to Spivi.

Meanwhile, the Spivi Home app allows gym members to take part in live and on-demand classes from home, staying connected with their community and training with their favourite instructors. Metrics and performance history help riders stay accountable and motivated. The app also includes Spivi Workout Creator, which allows instructors to design structured workouts.

spivi.com

The post APProved by you appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

In 1999, Danish brothers Mads and Per Nissen founded Fusion in a bid to change the status quo of sportswear. In the mid-90s, they had operated a sports shop where they faced two major challenges: firstly, product lines were very fashion-focused – they wanted more focus on functionality and technology – and second, it was a supplier-led industry where large pre-orders had to be placed many months in advance, tying up retailers’ liquidity.

Focusing initially on the triathlon world they themselves knew, they began to develop their own high-performance sportswear with a focus on usage and functionality. Their mission: to create a long-term, timeless collection where the quality and technical function of the same products would be continually refined, rather than bringing out new, short-term, seasonal products.

What they created – and what we still manufacture today – is a range of sportswear that’s comfortable, durable, highly functional and uncompromising.

Our collections now span running, cycling, triathlon, gym workouts and ‘recharge’ – which is about comfort on recovery days – and we cater for everyday exercisers through to elite athletes. But what unites all our gear is that we create clothing for when it matters. If you’re going for a short run in 20 degree heat, really any clothing is OK. It’s when you want to train seriously, including in bad weather, that you need the right gear. That’s when we step in, with high-quality, technical sportswear.

What are your USPs?

Our USPs are rooted in three core principles: durable, measurable and comfortable.

Our products really last: you’ll regularly see people using Fusion gear that’s 10+ years old and still going strong. We continually invest in R&D, but we stick to core products and our evolution is functional, not fashion-led: you’ll never see us launching the new season’s colours!

All our products are tested by pro athletes as well as at our in-house lab. The majority of the materials we use have already been developed to our high specifications, but we then rub-test them as well: normally 15,000 rubs is considered very good, but we won’t use fabrics that don’t achieve 30,000. Meanwhile, if we removed Fusion Power Locks from our products – our signature red stitching – we could reduce production costs by 20 per cent, but it’s key to our durability and we won’t compromise. As a family-owned business, we can stay true to our values.

Measurable is about results. We’re talking wind tunnels, track trials and so on – as well as the results our elite athletes achieve – to measure the impact of each product refinement. The refinements are continual – we’re on our 1,000th iteration of some products by now – but each is tiny, to the point that you’ll see elite athletes winning medals in Fusion products that are five years old.

Finally, comfort is crucial: all the highly technical elements of our clothing are there in a way you can’t feel. If you’re going to be on a bike for several hours, the best cycling bib is the one you don’t notice.

The pay-off of these three principles is that when you’re wearing our products, you’re unstoppable.

Sustainability is an important USP, too, and it goes back to our durability: how long you use a product matters. It also goes back to our EU-based, small order manufacturing that ensures retailers only ever have to purchase what they know they will sell right now. We never over-produce. [For more details, please see A Sustainable Agenda.]

Tell us about your elite athletes.

We work with a large number of elite athletes, from triathlon world champions to track cycling record holders to UCI cycling team Colo Quick.

Crucially, we develop partnerships rather than traditional sponsorships: we’re part of professional athletes’ training as they prepare for competition. They might come to us with a small feature they want to add to their clothing, for example, which we prototype at our Danish head office and give them within weeks. If it gives the desired results, we’ll roll it into our production.

Because this is another thing that’s different about Fusion: those elite-led refinements are built into our core product lines, meaning elite athletes wear standard Fusion items when they compete and achieve their world records. Whatever they need, we can simply pick it off the shelf and send it to them immediately.  Other people can buy it, too.

What we don’t have is entry-level clothing: ours is premium sportswear where the difference between our cheaper and more expensive products is down to functionality. For example, if you’re new to triathlon, you’ll be most interested in comfort and easily getting in and out of your suit to go to the toilet. If you’re a pro triathlete, you don’t care about that: you’ll go to the toilet in your suit! What you want are aerodynamics and water repellence so your suit is the same weight wet as dry.

How much of a difference can the right gear make?

Let me tell you about our new line, Tempo, which launched in March: a high performance collection spanning triathlon suit, running tights and shorts, cycling bib and cycling jersey.

We’ve been working on Tempo for a year in collaboration with pro triathlete Sam Laidlow and he used a prototype of the suit in the Hawaii 2022 World Championships, where he set the fastest bike split ever. The previous record holder also beat his own record by a few seconds, but Sam smashed the record by four minutes. That isn’t purely down to our suit, of course, but it was a big part of it.

What’s the best sportswear for indoor cycling?

There are two distinct worlds in indoor cycling. There are those who usually ride outdoors, who in the winter also connect their road bike to a home trainer such as Wahoo, plus something like Zwift, to train indoors. Then there are those who do indoor cycling classes at the gym.

The former will generally wear the same gear indoors as outdoors: with our Cycling Core collection, you can mix and match from just nine core products to train in any weather. Indoors, in the privacy of your own home, that probably means cycling shorts and bib.

For those taking part in indoor cycling classes, the advice is different. Here, the main considerations are the environment – you’re likely to get pretty sweaty – and the wider, more comfortable seat post on a studio bike compared to a road bike. Wearing a normal pair of bib tights with a big pad is a mistake in an indoor cycling class: you don’t need that much padding and it’ll just soak up your sweat and make you uncomfortable.

My advice for indoor cycling classes is to wear multi-sport tights, which are like running tights but more fitted, paired with a singlet. Our multi-sport tights  have a smaller fleece pad and a layer that wicks sweat away from the skin. This combination will give you optimum workout comfort in a group cycling studio environment.

The post Clothing for when it matters appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

“We don’t see our app totally replacing consoles,” say Allan Steen Olesen and Kresten Juel Jensen, co-founders of Motosumo. “However, we do believe it’s time to do things differently in indoor cycling, and consoles just can’t match what you can do on a smartphone any more, either visually or in terms of interaction, gamification and social connection.

“Behaviours also continue to evolve. When we launched in 2017, people said members would never bring their phones to the gym: that clubs and instructors wouldn’t allow it. Now it’s normal: we have over 300,000 people signed up to Motosumo and most use it in the gym, while instructors are the ones onboarding people so they can use our app to make classes even more fun.”

“It’s time to do things differently in indoor cycling. Consoles just can’t match what you can do on a smartphone any more”

So what is Motosumo? An open platform for gyms, instructors and members, it’s based on a hardware-agnostic smartphone app that connects to any make or model of stationary bike to unlock a premium experience – however entry-level the bike itself. The idea: “To make it easier to deliver interesting, data-driven indoor cycling experiences.”

On a smart bike, Motosumo connects via Bluetooth, with the bike’s sensors sending their usual data to the app. On other bikes, you place your phone on the handlebars and the vibration from the bike feeds through the phone’s accelerometer and gyroscope to be translated into cadence, distance and calories. How accurately? “Very: we’re talking +/- one or two RPM.”

Additional data can be drawn into the app by connecting to an external heart rate monitor or power meter.

But Motosumo does more than data: it also connects bikes – and their users – into one shared social experience. Simply create a group, invite riders to join and you’re all in there together, taking part in real-time races, leaderboards and charity team challenges.

It gives in-person instructors a raft of new motivational tools, but it’s also great for clubs’ live streams. These can flow through the usual channels – Instagram or Facebook Live, for example – but with Motosumo added to the mix, instructors can see members’ workout data and interact in real time with a personal touch. There’s lots of scope for feedback via polls and emojis, too: “Ask everyone how they’re feeling – if you get lots of red faces back, you know they’re working hard – or launch a poll to see who’s up for a race.”

Motosumo’s own classes, live streamed around the clock from various global locations, are equally interactive and require nothing more than a Chrome browser to cast to a big screen. Clubs can therefore use these to maximise off-peak studio occupancy, offering an engaging experience where people across the globe can ride together. Data shows those doing live classes stay two to three times longer than those doing on-demand.

And since November 2022, all of this is free to gyms as well as end users. “It’s perfect timing in the evolution of our business model,” say Olesen and Jensen. “At a time of economic challenge, we’re bringing operators exactly what they want, at no cost. We have hundreds of clubs waiting to be onboarded.”

“Some manufacturers seem happy. Others seem nervous they may need to sell their bikes at a lower premium.”

And how are bike manufacturers responding? “It’s 50/50. Some seem happy they can get rid of the electronic complication of consoles, but others seem nervous they may need to sell their bikes at a lower premium.

“As we say, we aren’t trying to replace consoles, but by making this level of experience available to everyone with a phone, it’s fair to expect that manufacturers’ bread-and-butter models may be console-free in the not too distant future.”

BODY BIKE: The phone is the future

“Just look at everything we now do via our mobile phones,” says Vinni Hansen, R&D project manager at BODY BIKE International. “We pay through it, track our steps on it, verify our identity through it. Your phone is now you, to the point that it’s hard to be away from it even for an hour these days. From an exerciser perspective, it makes real sense to move away from consoles and towards mobile phones.”

She continues: “It makes sense from an operator perspective, too. You no longer have to pay a premium for a bike with a hi-tech console, and what you buy is future-proofed: there’s no console to maintain, service or go out of date. It’s the member who provides the technology, and with each new app update, the experience is instantly upgraded.”

“As an operator, what you buy is future-proofed. The member provides the technology. Each new app update instantly upgrades the experience.”

It was this thinking that led BODY BIKE to do away with integrated consoles six years ago. Instead, BODY BIKE Smart+ bikes use Bluetooth to link to a BODY BIKE app, transforming exercisers’ own mobile phones into portable consoles.

Hansen continues: “The fact that exercisers get to take their data away with them at the end of class is probably the most important thing for us. It matters for two reasons, the first of which is about motivation and tracking. All your workout data is instantly there in your phone, including an excellent end-of-ride summary that includes average wattage – the key measure of how hard you’ve worked. You can also instantly check your history to monitor your progress.

“We don’t collect or sell data, ever. It’s the individual’s choice where and how their data is stored and shared.”

“The second is privacy. We talk about ‘your ride, your data’, because with BODY BIKE, your data is private. We don’t collect or sell any of it, ever. You can share it if you choose: there’s an option to upload it directly to Strava, while all it takes is a quick screenshot to show friends what you’ve done. But equally, we believe it should be the individual’s choice where and how their data is stored and shared.”

A personalised user experience is another key benefit of using an app: “Do an FTP test through our app and all the zones in your subsequent workouts will be geared to you rather than to default settings. You can work towards status achievements and medals in our app, too, which is a really popular feature.

“In a future release, you’ll also be able to choose which metrics matter most to you, whether that’s calories for weight loss or wattage for power training. Those stats will then appear big and bold on your personalised dashboard.

“Which brings us to the enhanced display on a phone: a far more engaging, motivating UX than you get on a console, with wonderful clarity, detail and brightness of colour.

“A phone screen is also backlit – even in a dark studio you can always see it clearly – and on our bikes you can charge your phone as you ride, with the power you put through the pedals converted to electricity. The downside: yes, you might see an SMS come through while you’re working out. But the positives for both club and exerciser far outweigh this brief distraction.

“Plus as I say, all it takes is an app update to share new features with every user around the world. Based on user feedback, we’re currently exploring options such as lap times, screen sharing to a TV and receiving heart rate data from a smartwatch.”

Supplier round table: Mobile moves

Other manufacturers are moving in a similar direction, with Wattbike one strong example. Head of commercial Tom Crampton explains: “In 2017, when we launched our Wattbike Atom home product, we recognised that a console wasn’t needed in this environment and removed it in favour of a mobile app. We’re slowly seeing things move in this direction within the commercial landscape as well. We haven’t yet seen the industry crying out for console-free products, but we have the capability to do this.”

Although commercial Wattbikes still carry consoles, users can effectively push these into the background in favour of an app display if they choose, connecting to the Wattbike Hub app, the new subscription-based Wattbike Hub+ or one of a number of third-party apps. Both Wattbike apps unlock additional data, content features and, particularly in the premium version, personalisation.

“Apps are redefining and enhancing the ride, creating a premium rider experience”

Once connected, app and console run in parallel but the app takes control: it’s the app that shows your real-time workout data, and by carrying your profile and historical data with you, every workout is personalised, focusing on your preferred metrics as you work towards your goals.

“Recognising the shift towards apps, we’ve been investing in our digital product development for some time now,” says Crampton. “Apps are redefining and enhancing the ride, allowing us to prescribe and personalise training for even greater results. They’re creating a new, premium rider experience.”

Phones to the forefront

Meanwhile, “50 per cent of Stages bikes in the marketplace don’t have a console at all,” says Paddy Murray, VP of global marketing & international sales, as he highlights the uptake of Stages Studio Boost software at rhythm cycling venues.

“It doesn’t mean data isn’t used in these experiences: it just means collection is passive, putting the focus on the instructor, music and vibe. There’s no display of any kind and data isn’t used for motivation during class, although you can get an email afterwards that tells you how well your pedal stroke stayed on the beat of the music, for example.”

“50 per cent of our bikes in the marketplace don’t have a console at all”

He continues: “I don’t think apps will entirely replace consoles, but they will become the dominant method of collecting and/or displaying data. Consoles don’t know who you are, what you did last week or your fitness level, so they aren’t great at telling you how hard to work: they just display your current workout data. Meanwhile, phones are our constant companions and have such high-quality screens, data processing abilities, connectivity, useability, easily upgradable apps… It makes sense to put them at the heart of an intuitive class experience.”

A number of commercial Stages bikes therefore come with a crank arm-based power meter either as standard or as an optional add-on, which in turn connects via Bluetooth to the Stages Studio+ app. The real-time metrics are the same as on the console, but now you’re working with a device that can overlay your personalised zones, plus you hold your own data for post-class analysis.

A personalised experience

Over at Spinning®, three of the new Spinner bikes for 2023 have consoles. The rest – whether via a power crank, heart rate monitor and/or cadence sensor on the bike – can connect to Spinning apps on riders’ own mobiles or tablets, unlocking robust metrics, performance tracking and content.

Athleticum’s Sarah Morelli, Spinning’s UK & Ireland distributor, explains: “The console and app pull from the same data sources, but while consoles work independently – they collect data, but are designed to clear it for the next rider – the app records your data and works directly with this. Personalisation therefore comes through the app.”

“The next step will be helping instructors move to class design based on personalisation”

She adds: “For some audiences, there will still be a place for bikes with consoles, allowing you to get on and ride with no need to connect: less tech-savvy individuals, for example, and school partnerships where data is protected. However, in this era of health-tech and post-pandemic health awareness, it’s important that we offer riders the ability to take their data with them, and to link with other health and fitness apps for a rounded view of their health data.

“The next step will be super-interesting, helping our instructors move from class design to class design based on personalisation for superior results – a win-win for studios and their members.”

Consoles – for now

Other manufacturers remain more focused on consoles, at least for now. Matrix Fitness has no console-free commercial bikes at this stage, and head of group exercise product Becky Jalbert believes demand for consoles will remain for the foreseeable future. Matrix does, however, have some bikes that can also connect to and share workout data with third-party apps, allowing users to track their performance and periodise workouts over time, as well as communicate progress to their physician where relevant.

Similarly Schwinn, while offering two models of bike that can connect to an app, does not yet have its own cycling app. The ‘bring your own experience’ functionality of its console-free X Bike is therefore, at present, more readily embraced by solo riders and individual owners than by clubs and studios.

“In group cycle classes, if one person in the room is having a problem, it affects the experience for everyone,” says Travis Vaughan, Schwinn’s senior director of product management & technology. “The operators we work with therefore want to remove variables that might possibly create negative experiences, and today, that means the easy option is to buy a bike with the display built in.”

However, he adds: “Perhaps there is a future where riders can choose if they want the enhanced experience with app or simply ride without it. If/when we invest in creating an app to use with our bikes, it may shift the math on the experience. At the moment it feels it will be slower than we want it to be, but we’ll keep moving in this direction.”

The post Mobile vs Console appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

It’s true that in the US, Mindbody recently reported a 39 per cent drop in cycling class attendance (Jan–July 2022 vs Jan–July 2021). Yet it’s important to note that group cycling wasn’t the only discipline to feel the pinch: yoga was also down 31 per cent, dance 14 per cent, CrossFit 9 per cent. Equally important to note that this is data for a market hit by Flywheel’s demise and SoulCycle’s multiple studio closures.

Meanwhile, other brands are doing well – even in the US. Barry’s is moving ahead with the roll-out of its RIDE x LIFT concept, for example (see trend #7), while Xponential’s CycleBar now has more than 260 studios open and agreements signed to move into Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

And indoor cycling remains the #1 group exercise format in markets like the Netherlands, where concepts such as Holy Ride have been inspired and shaped by customer demand.

So, the fall isn’t universal. Indeed, as Peloton adjusts and restructures for a world in which consumers have a choice about where they exercise, it seems in-person is where it’s at once again. 

The key is this: indoor cycling is still very much alive when done well. Whatever their model, fitness facilities must continue to innovate and experiment within their cycle offering to keep it relevant – a go-to workout – in an era in which Experience, with a capital E, is now the customer expectation. 

Of course, there’s only so much you can do on a static bike, so experience will lean into the environment, soundtrack, community and vibe you create as much as the programming (which, incidentally, still has scope for innovation – see trends #7 and #10). 

As Holy Ride’s Tom Moos told RIDE HIGH earlier this year: “Indoor cycling will become increasingly immersive and experiential. There are still a lot of dark boxes at the moment!”

#2 Boutiques buddy up

Ever since the pandemic wreaked havoc on the fitness sector, many standalone – and especially single-discipline – boutiques have been finding it particularly hard-going. 

“Even pre-COVID, businesses in our sector had struggled: there were record attendances at boutique studios, but head office costs made it hard to make money,” the founders of UK-based United Fitness Brands (UFB) told us when we interviewed them in May 2022. “We realised there was an opportunity to drive significant economies of scale by joining forces.”

It therefore comes as little surprise that more and more boutique brands are ‘buddying up’, coming under one roof at head office, in-club, or both. 

UFB, for example, has now brought together four boutique operations, primarily at a head office level but also via a number of dual-brand locations in London. Its founders told RIDE HIGH they now hope to create multi-brand studios in smaller cities across the UK.

Elsewhere we’re seeing different takes on buddying up. In the Netherlands, Urban Gym Group (UGG) has brought multiple fitness brands under its umbrella, including boutique brand HIGH STUDIOS. Offering strategic guidance, shared resources and a cluster approach to conquer target cities – notably Amsterdam – with its portfolio of brands, UGG has also grown the reach of HIGH STUDIOS by creating HIGH-branded group exercise studios inside its ClubSportive and Trainmore clubs.

“Ever since the pandemic, many standalone and single-discipline boutiques have found it hard-going”

Then there’s newcomer Drop Fitness (see our chat with founder Jeb Balise in our special cost of living supplement: A Global Crisis?). Drop opened its inaugural site in New Jersey, US, in May 2022, bringing together four existing, third-party, best-in-class boutique brands alongside private training and a gym floor. All available on a ‘pay for what you want, when you want’ basis, Drop pays each boutique brand a revenue share.

“It’s a great way for boutique brands to grow and scale across the country, beyond the big cities where they traditionally operate,” says Balise. “For a boutique to come out to the suburbs on its own would cost so much time, energy and money, all for a 2,000sq ft space. Town planning permissions can sometimes be brutal, and doing it for a 25,000sq ft space is much more efficient.”

Expect to see more of this in 2023 as boutiques battle to weather not only the repercussions of the pandemic, but now also the energy crisis, spiralling inflation and expectations of salary increases.

#3 A sustainable agenda

Environmental sustainability has been on the agenda of most businesses for years now, and we’ve seen some moves in the right direction within the indoor cycling sector. Operators such as the UK’s 1Rebel have been free from single-use plastic for a while now, for example, while Terra Hale markets itself as ‘London’s first eco-friendly fitness destination’, generating electricity from its indoor cycling classes (see our special supplement: A Global Crisis?)

From a supplier perspective, BODY BIKE OceanIX is the eco-warrior’s indoor bike – the first in the world to be manufactured using plastic from recycled fishing nets – and in 2021, BODY BIKE also launched a best-in-class eCargo bike. “It’s a bit of a departure from our usual fitness sector territory, but we have the capacity in our factory and it just feels like the next ‘right thing to do’,” said CEO Uffe A Olesen.

But as the energy crisis ramps up, gas and electricity prices threaten the very existence of our sector and the world accelerates towards a climate crisis, clubs can’t view sustainability as a mere passion project. It has to be embedded at the heart of what we do – and as Terra Hale proves, bikes aren’t just energy-efficient thanks to not needing power. They can also be energy generators. Now is the time to explore this potential.

“Bikes aren’t just energy-efficient thanks to not needing power. They can also be energy generators.”

#4 No digital divide

Over recent years, hybrid models have been the hot topic of the fitness sector. Now the buzzword is ‘omnichannel’.

“As the number of channels proliferates, equal importance must be given to digital and in-person,” advised Paul Bowman, CEO of Wexer, in RIDE HIGH #16. “Every customer will use multiple touchpoints and expect to dive straight in to a familiar experience each time. 

“The challenge for clubs is to deliver exactly the same user experience whatever the point of entry.”

While we’re seeing a growing number of third parties creating digital content for both in-club and at-home use, Bowman believes clubs’ own star trainers are key to a consistent experience. It’s why Wexer’s ecosystem now allows clubs to stream self-produced content not only to at-home digital platforms, but also onto the big screen of in-club virtual studios.

“Every club operator should maximise opportunities to put their own stars in front of their customers”

“If you’re looking for an advantage over the big digital players and the global fitness influencers, your team of local rockstars with their loyal member followings is it,” Bowman advises. “Every club operator should be maximising opportunities to put these stars in front of customers, both on-site and at-home. And that means creating digital content fronted by them.”

For a great example, look no further than Thailand’s trailblazing Absolute Group, which was quick off the mark in identifying the dual value of digital content for at-home as well as in-club, launching its Absolute X hybrid studio concept in 2022. 

“With this second distribution channel, we’re very happy to continue investing in high-quality digital content,” confirms founder and CEO Ben Karoonkornsakul. 

It can be an expensive undertaking, yet members will forgive lower production quality if they’re seeing their favourite instructors on-screen. Expect more branded digital experiences that cost-effectively maximise yield and usage of cycling studios, as well as supporting members at home.

#5 A new reality

In summer 2022, RIDE HIGH spoke to Emma Barry – global fitness authority and renowned group exercise expert – and Les Mills legend Steven Renata about indoor cycling past, present and future.

In our chat, Barry was hugely enthusiastic about the digital innovations coming down the line for group cycling. Some of the topics she touched on might reasonably expect to be a trend in their own right, but in our top 10 we’ve pushed them all together into one digital innovations trend that hints at an exhilarating future for indoor cycling.

We’re talking AR, VR, the metaverse. “Anything that brings digital enhancement into the real world for an extended, mixed reality – especially when it includes a social element of cycling together, remotely,” says Barry.

“We’ve seen the rise and fall of Peloton and friends, but they’ve unquestionably given a huge nod to health and wellness along the way, driving up awareness of fitness and just how good the experience can be, as well as showing us all how ‘sticky’ an online community can be.”

She continues: “Once they get the eyewear down, the bike is the perfect tool for AR and VR. We already wear sunglasses when we’re riding outside, so once the headsets aren’t so large and sweat-inducing, that’s going to be very interesting. We’ll literally be able to be in another world as we cycle. 

“AR will be able to transpose all kinds of information and metrics to those who are motivated by data”

“AR will be able to transpose all kinds of information and metrics to those motivated by data: personalised power output, position in the pack, headwind, lighting, direction cues and so on. VR will be able to emulate and enhance existing worlds, such as the great races around the globe: the Ironman World Championship in Kona, the Tour de France, the Red Bull UCI Pump Track World Champs. We’ll be able to achieve unlimited participation and presumably get to sync data to achieve validated comparison. 

“Weaving in and out of the metaverse – the meeting place of different realities – will become more seamless and enhanced over the next 20 years as we take our data and avatars with us across the various worlds to achieve our own unique goals. 

“Finally, one really cool thing I saw at CES 2020 was Delta Airlines’ unveiling of Parallel Reality, designed to tailor a passenger’s experience using biometrics. We’re talking complete immersion in an opt-in, personalised experience – and it’s now being trialled at Detroit airport.

“Essentially, multiple passengers can look at the same screen but only see their own unique travel data: their flight information and directions to the gate, weather at their final destination, directions to a Sky Club – all in the language of the passenger’s choice. 

“It’s not too much of a stretch to see how the fitness data we already cast to screens – heart rate, for example – could be expanded on and personalised in an equally meaningful way.”

 #6 Self-determination

While it’s true that not everyone wants to focus on metrics in their workouts – it’s why rhythm cycling has become so popular the world over – nevertheless there are many fitness fans around the world who like to keep track of their progress. And of course, whether you’re an app developer or club operator, this data can be gold dust; used well, it is the source of unparalleled behavioural insights and the basis of a personalised experience.

Yet the question remains: who owns this data? And increasingly the answer is: the individual. If you buy into that – and at RIDE HIGH, we do – then our role as fitness providers must be to help people make sense of their data, giving them the insights and understanding they need to plot their next steps, without overstepping the privacy mark. 

This will be a challenge as exercisers increasingly mix and match workout locations and platforms; it will first require a willingness to openly share data across platforms, so the individual can opt into and be presented with one cohesive picture of their efforts.

This is why BODY BIKE has already done away with consoles, instead allowing exercisers to download its app and use their own mobile phone as their console. They then immediately take their data away with them at the end of each workout. It’s also why the BODY BIKE Strava club was created, allowing exercisers to upload their BODY BIKE indoor cycling workouts into their Strava account. They can then share workout data with fellow enthusiasts and access a full record of all their cycling sessions in one place. 

We need more of this moving forward, putting members and their progress first by making data sharing easier – especially if we are to avoid tech fatigue as digital solutions continue to proliferate and it becomes harder and harder to access one clear picture.

#7 Fusion workouts

We’ve reported previously on the growth of fusion cycling classes and now, in 2023, this trend looks set to go up another gear, with the likes of Barry’s rolling out RIDE x LIFT.

The class follows Barry’s tried-and-tested formula, whereby members alternate between cardio and strength-based programming. In this case, however, the bike replaces the treadmill of the brand’s signature bootcamp class, making for a more accessible and lower-impact workout.

Why is this trend so interesting? Because it ticks so many boxes: a chance for operators to create something unique for their clubs – a signature, branded experience – and for members to take part in a ‘bang for their buck’ workout that keeps them engaged, gives them a great all-round workout and offers high perceived value for money. 

As clubs continue to innovate to keep their cycling workouts fresh, fusion classes will become an increasingly popular tool.

#8 An educational experience

The future of indoor cycling will, we hope, see instructor education become more specialised. 

RIDE HIGH recently spoke to Angela Reed-Fox of the Indoor Cycling Institute, who told us: “Many instructors just want to excel at indoor cycling: the discipline is heading into its own space and that’s entirely right. 

“I believe it’s outdated to expect instructors to also have a certificate in gym instructing, PT or exercise to music. Cycling shouldn’t be CPD on top of one of those qualifications. Rather, there should be regularly updated, indoor cycling CPD on top of a dedicated, entry-level indoor cycling certificate.”

Hear absolutely hear. For an excellent discussion on how indoor cycling education and qualifications need to evolve to give us the instructor workforce we need for the future, check out our recent panel discussion here. 

“Many instructors just want to excel at indoor cycling: the discipline is heading into its own space and that’s entirely right. It shouldn’t be CPD on top of other qualifications”

#9 Recovery-plus

Recovery is one of the buzzwords in the fitness sector right now; RIDE HIGH has already reported on how this is impacting programming in the indoor cycling arena. 

But what about instructors? For a long time almost disregarded in this respect – expected to simply keep going, churning out class after class after class with little rest – attention is finally turning to helping indoor cycling instructors avoid downtime through illness and injury, and ultimately extend their careers. 

In the UK, Susie Millen’s My Vocal Fitness focuses on preserving instructor voices. RIDE HIGH stalwart Noël Nocciolo does similar in the US under the banner of PEP for FitPros. 

“As fitness professionals, we learn about almost every muscle in the body,” says Millen. “Rarely, though, are we taught how to use our voice or a microphone effectively. The result: instructors across the planet aren’t vocally ready to teach the volume of classes they’re timetabled to deliver each week. Their voices become unreliable, deteriorating, even lost.”

Meanwhile, power training expert Hunter Allen recently offered RIDE HIGH some incredible insights into the physiological strain placed on cycling instructors’ bodies, in a fascinating feature on the Training Stress Score. 

“After six weeks of instructing two cycling classes a day, an instructor’s chronic training load could be 160 – the same as a pro cyclist at the end of the Tour de France,” he explained. Little wonder, then, that injury and illness are so common among frequently timetabled cycle studio stars. 

Our view: when it comes to our workforce, it shouldn’t just be about recovery. We need to see a much greater focus on prevention of injury and strain, bringing longevity to instructors’ careers in a healthy and sustainable way.

#10 A broader church

Over the last couple of years, we’ve seen fitness newcomers finally turning to our sector, their newfound appreciation of our value born from the pandemic. In turn, a more diverse global member base is gathering – one that spans a broad range of fitness levels, experiences and expectations.

On the one hand, says global fitness authority Emma Barry, there are now more people enjoying ‘The Sport of Fitness’ – being fit for fit’s sake and finding a favourite exercise genre, rather than training to be fit for a sport. 

Yet at the same time, we’re also in an era when – still jaded by the pandemic – many are exercising for reasons that are as much mental, emotional and even spiritual as they are physical. “People are looking for entertainment, they’re looking for release, and most of all, at this time in history, they’re looking for joy and hope,” confirms Barry. 

This diversity in the member base holds an important lesson for indoor cycling instructors and providers, as Tash Marshall Bean explained in a recent interview with RIDE HIGH: “With the pandemic bringing a wave of new people into fitness, it’s more important than ever that we take classes back to basics. 

“I’m currently seeing far too many instructors making the choreography too complicated for their riders and leaving people behind. Every single participant must feel successful, and instructors must (re)learn how to integrate new riders with well-versed riders to achieve this.”

“The more generic the experience, the less likely you are to really engage someone. We need targeted classes.”

Even better, said Louise Ager in the same panel discussion, would be a return to “diversity in class styles to support a broader audience in indoor cycling”. 

She added: “The more generic the experience, the less likely you are to really engage someone. We need targeted classes that have a purpose and an intentional audience: classes for beginners, for overweight people, for seniors, for endurance enthusiasts, for those short of time, for fans of different music genres.”

This conscious targeting is exactly what House of Workouts has done with the launch of its new SclptCycle programme.

One thing is for sure: moving forward the indoor cycling sector must work to ensure its product delivers strongly to an increasingly diverse audience.

The post Trending now appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

Clear your diary for the next seven and a half minutes and watch as Emma Barry and Steven Renata share not only their memories and anecdotes, but also their predictions for what happens next in the world of indoor cycling.

We’re talking metaverse, data, the sport of fitness and the quest for joy.That’s quite some leap forward from the stories they share of wheeling bikes in and out of a multi-purpose aerobics studio.

Oh, and thanks to Steven for the shout-out for RIDE HIGH, now officially “the world’s biggest cycle club”. Love it!

“this video is what it’s all about. This is what sets indoor cycling apart. This is why the world needs to ride.”

– So says Uffe A Olesen, CEO of BODY BIKE International. Click on the link below to soak in the vibe of the event and see why he’s still buzzing in its aftermath…

The post Legend has it appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

However, my siblings – Valerie and Calvin – and I had grown up between Singapore and California. In fact, we were students in Los Angeles when, inspired by the likes of SoulCycle, Calvin and I separately came up with the idea of launching our own studio.

“Being siblings determines how we run the company. The sense of community runs deep. Our family values are why our brand is so strong.”

We had become addicted to the ‘party on a bike’ vibe and we qualified as indoor cycling instructors, initially just so we could keep doing that style of training in our own workouts. However, we knew we wanted to bring something fun to Singapore, Valerie came on-board too and CRU was born.

How would you describe CRU?
CRU is more than just boutique fitness, more than just physical locations. It’s a lifestyle brand: a culmination of music, fitness and lifestyle. Crucially, it’s also about family and community – what we call our wolfpack.

We launched with rhythm cycling in 2014, opening our first CruCycle studio at 68 Duxton Road, Singapore. Our intention was always to expand into more concepts across multiple studios, though, with a growth mindset that’s encapsulated in our name: CRU. ‘Cru’ draws from the French language, where in the world of wines it relates to top quality production growth; for us, it represents our ethos of organic spiritual, mental and physical growth.

Our second studio opened in Los Angeles in 2017: a boxing concept launched under the CruBox brand. As with CruCycle, and indeed all our programmes since, the workout was set to the beat of the music and quickly became a success story, leading us to open CruBox in Singapore – in the same building as our first CruCycle – in 2019.

In 2021, we opened a new flagship on Orchard Road, in the heart of Singapore, bringing us to three locations in the city. This time we had two studios in one location: a CruCycle studio and a multi-purpose studio offering CruYoga and CruHIIT.

Alongside our physical studios sits our CRU TV digital platform and CRU TV Bike, while over the years we’ve also launched things like merchandise and a lifestyle blog.

Tell us about the wolfpack.
The wolfpack is our community, as I say, and that’s what we’re all about at CRU: a sense of family, of familiar faces. We believe that through togetherness, we’re able to achieve so much more than we would be able to achieve alone. In our workouts, you follow the Pack Leader – the instructor – to grow as a pack and become stronger together.

“CRU is synonymous with indoor cycling in Singapore and it’s still at the heart of what we do, even as we expand into more concepts”

We have a wide demographic age-wise, although our core audience is around 25–40 years old, but we do sit at the premium end of the market. We charge S$45 for a single class and S$400 for a 10-pack across all disciplines, so we have a fairly affluent customer base – generally CEOs and those in other senior positions who are looking for an hour’s respite from long days at their desks.

We do cater for all levels, but at the same time ours are known to be the toughest workouts in town. It’s back to CRU’s wolfpack mentality: people come to push themselves.

And our instructors reflect our customer profile: aged 24–46 years, a good number of them originally came to us as customers.

Incidentally, the notion of the wolfpack was also inspired by our love of dogs. All three of us each have a pet husky – the silhouette in the CRU logo – and the communal areas of our studios are dog-friendly. In 2019, we even launched a PUPS at CRU sub-brand selling all-natural dog treats and toys!

What are your USPs?
Singapore is fairly conservative, but the way we do things at CRU is more relaxed, friendly, open-minded, comfortable: people call it the ‘CRU Swag’. It’s just that bit more outspoken and daring than you get elsewhere in Singapore, influenced by our US upbringing.

We train all our instructors to think out of the box, pushing themselves out of their own comfort zones to interact with our customers in new ways – cheering, clapping and so on. And people respond very positively: CRU becomes the one place they let go and experience a real sense of release.

“Singapore is fairly conservative, but the way we do things at CRU is more relaxed. People refer to our vibe as the ‘CRU Swag’.”

Quality of instruction is another USP. It tends to be that instructors work their way up to becoming a CRU instructor. Ours is their ultimate, aspirational destination – once they reach us, they stay with us – but even then, every CRU instructor goes through at least eight weeks of training, 15 hours a week, before they take a class. We also design all our own programming. Quality is a CRU hallmark across the board.

Underpinning all of this, we’ve simply been doing this a long time now. We know who we are and what we’re doing. Our riders have grown with us, we’ve pushed our programming to challenge them and we’ve played the long game. CRU is now synonymous with indoor cycling in Singapore. It’s also still at the heart of what we do, even as we expand into more concepts. In fact, we’re often referred to as the O.G. – Original Gangsta – brand!

Last but not least, our sibling relationship is key. We were kids when we started out, in our early 20s, and we stepped on each others’ toes. But blood is thicker than water and our close relationship now underpins CRU’s sense of community. Being siblings determines how we run the company, which influences how our instructors feel about working for us, which influences customer perceptions. The sense of community runs deep. Our family values are why our brand is so strong.

How did COVID impact CRU?
In 2020, in response to COVID, we started creating our own content so customers could train at home. It started off fairly simply: only business owners were allowed to go into a business premises, so it was just me, Calvin and a single bike in our Duxton Road CruBox studio. There I was, on-stage, surrounded by boxing bags, teaching to Calvin behind the camera!

Eventually the government allowed us to bring in five instructors, on a rota, so we could offer a bit more variety in our content. We made the decision not to build our library by having our instructors filming from home, though. We wanted to ensure the brand experience was as good as it could be, even in those early days.

Our customers paid for this online content from the outset and we also rented out our bikes; within two hours of the Singaporean government announcing lockdown, we had already rented all 200 bikes. So, we had a revenue stream throughout COVID.

We’re also fortunate that our membership didn’t really worry about COVID. They were always desperate to train. We’ve had two major lockdowns in Singapore, but in between, every class has been waitlisted.

In our cycling studio, capacity was reduced from almost 50 bikes to just 12, so we put on classes every hour from 7.00am to 10.00pm to keep up with demand. Only now are we finally able to start scaling that back, with 25 bikes per class meaning we’ve been able to drop two classes a day from the timetable.

In a strange way, though, COVID was good for us. It gave us a chance to build our digital product and experiment with a few things. We tested our yoga concept in an outdoor space we had, for example, rather than having to build a new location straight away. Meanwhile, our HIIT concept came from seeing what people were enjoying online during lockdown.

We also continued our charitable work during lockdown, including a big campaign over six weekends where we ran Zoom classes and asked people to donate to take part. We raised around S$20,000, which we shared across a number of different charities.

Tell us more about CRU TV.
Since early 2021, we have our own film production studio and our own CRU TV digital platform, and we’ve continued to evolve our content and its quality. Calvin now takes the lead on digital production, while Valerie is our marketing and PR expert and I’m CRU master trainer, in charge of instructors and programming.

We also have our own CRU TV Bike with a 21.5” screen, and since COVID started – combining bike rentals plus sales of our CRU TV Bike – we’ve had over 1,000 bike transactions.

“In a strange way, COVID was good for us. It gave us a chance to build our digital product and experiment with a few things.”

If you purchase our bike – at a cost of S$3,800 including mat, weights and cleats – it comes with a year’s free subscription to all our content. Alternatively, if you just want our content, a subscription costs S$49 a month. And our content is really strong, filmed from multiple angles and now diversified to encompass all our programmes: cycling, boxing, HIIT and yoga.

We’ve also recently launched meditation classes online; the flexibility of digital means we can listen to customer feedback and experiment with new concepts. As another example, we’re currently developing a road cycling-type concept to sit alongside rhythm cycling in our CRU TV library. This will just be online for now, but you never know – we’ve got used to plans evolving quickly and dynamically over the last couple of years!

And your physical growth plans?
We’re in a good place in Singapore. I think there’s space for perhaps one more location before we start to cannibalise our own clubs. Ours is a higher price point, as I say, and there are only a small number of neighbourhoods that can support that. Our main objective in Singapore is to continue filling every class to capacity.

And then in Los Angeles, obviously we only have CruBox at the moment; when we launched, although we knew we could do cycling really well, the boutique cycling market was just so saturated. That’s changed over the last two years, though, with lots of studios closing down and a lot of good instructors moving on from their former brands. South-east Asia is our focus for now, but we’ll never say never when it comes to the US.

In terms of south-east Asia, before COVID we already had our eye on a number of potential markets to grow into, and the data we’re getting from CRU TV alongside enquiries for our CRU TV Bike – including from Malaysia, the Philippines, Tokyo, Indonesia, Hanoi and others – have validated our thinking. There haven’t really been any surprises for us in the data.

For now, while immigration rules keep changing, we’ll start with pop-ups – we have a number of these planned – but even after that, we’ll be careful in how we proceed. A lot of these countries are still developing and the law can make things tricky. In Thailand, just as an example, you need a local partner to launch any business. Yet of course, what makes us special – our brand, our soul and our story that’s all based on family – is very hard to hand over to someone else.

“I think we’ll expand into new markets in south-east Asia by next year, leading with cycling but most likely opening multi-purpose studios”

Nevertheless, I do think we’ll expand into new markets in south-east Asia by next year, leading with cycling but most likely opening multi-purpose studios to allow us to offer more than one concept in each location.

Any other plans you can tell us about?
We have a number of new lifestyle concepts in the pipeline: a coffee bar, for example, and food and nutrition including meal plans; I’m a qualified nutritionist as well as a master trainer. And as I say, we’re also continuing to experiment with our digital programming.

Ours is a story of constant evolution. Everything is always in progress. We’ve seen our audiences grow every year across all our concepts, but I still believe this is just the beginning for CRU.

RIDE HIGH readers can enjoy a free 30-day trial of CRU TV. Just visit crutvofficial.com
and use promo code RHXCRUTV30 – valid until 31 December 2022.

The post Bebe Ding appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

That much has already been extensively talked about, of course. But what comes next is vital: ensuring clubs are delivering a true hybrid experience, not merely ticking the box of hybrid technology.

As the buzzword becomes ‘omnichannel’, operators should be under no illusion that digital can be a mere add-on. Moving forward, equal importance must be given to digital and in-person, ensuring the same user experience is delivered whatever the point of entry.

And when I say the same, I mean exactly the same. Every customer will use multiple touchpoints and expect to dive straight in to a familiar experience each time.

Clubs must therefore learn to view everything they do as one big customer-centric experience – and I believe this experience has to be led by content.

Content is the element of a health club offering that can transcend all boundaries. Where equipment is to a large extent anchored in a physical club, content is replicable on any channel: in-club, online, through an app, smart TV, smart mirror or other smart device.

“Every customer will use multiple touchpoints and expect to dive straight in to a familiar experience each time”

Content also happens to be what today’s fitness consumer – now well-accustomed to working out with on-screen trainers – seeks inside your facility and out.

Content creation is therefore no longer an adjunct to the business of running a club. It is the very cornerstone of hybrid success, underpinning omnichannel delivery of your club experience.

People power
Content is also where the money now is, so it’s hardly surprising that everyone from celebrities to media networks seems hell-bent on becoming a fitness content provider these days. Yet clubs still have a major USP: their in-house superstars.

Group exercise instructors have been key to member loyalty for decades, renowned for building communities of enthusiastic followers, but they’ve become even stronger during lockdown as their personalities, programmes and friendly faces reached beyond club walls and made us all feel better during the pandemic.

Clubs must recognise the power their instructors and trainers now hold. They are the content creators. They are the face of your brand in the digital arena. They are also the faces your members know and the people who, as channels to market proliferate, have the power to reach huge audiences.

If you’re looking for an advantage over the big digital players and the global fitness influencers who try and seduce your members away with their ‘three months for free’ offers and their Hollywood eyes, this – your team of local rockstars, whose relationships with members weld them to your brand – is it.

It therefore goes without saying that every club operator should be maximising opportunities to put their in-house superstars in front of customers, both on-site and at-home – and that means creating digital content fronted by them.

Of course, most clubs already did this during lockdown, but it was a kneejerk response to unforeseeable circumstances, with content often shared for free on third-party platforms. Moving forward, what’s needed is a sustainable strategy for the production of ownable, brand-enhancing, monetisable, local superstar-led digital content.

“Our data shows that the more fresh content you create, the more forgiving members are on quality”

A case in point
Why bother? Let’s take a look at Asia Pacific’s Evolution Wellness, which launched its web-based content platform – Virtual Studio – in partnership with Wexer in July 2021.

Fast-forward to January 2022 and our analysis of usage data to identify the most popular classes from Wexer’s global content library. To that analysis, we then added the content from Fitness First and Celebrity Fitness – two of Evolution’s brands in south-east Asia – and found that Evolution Wellness had 13 classes in the top 50 most viewed when aggregated across all our clients.

Clubs’ own content can be a huge usage driver, and in turn a major loyalty tool: the variety of Wexer’s global content library is what draws people to on-demand in the first place, but the locally-produced content plays a major role in keeping them there.

Self-produced content can also be a significant revenue driver. Recent Credit Suisse research found that 52 per cent of club members would be happy to pay for a digital tier to their membership, and our data backs this up: Evolution Wellness is projecting US$500,000 in Virtual Studio revenues for year one alone, all from existing members, with the lucrative prospect of non-geographically limited audiences as yet untapped.

Make the most of what you do
Producing digital content doesn’t have to be hard, either. Start by looking at your live timetable. Where are your superstars? Which are your waitlisted classes?

Maximise reach and ROI of these classes by installing a simple camera set-up in-studio and filming them; you’ll quickly compile a rich library of your own superstar-led content that can then be made available on-demand via your app, website, members’ smart TVs, even on the big screen of your in-club virtual studio.

It doesn’t even have to be beautifully produced. Our data shows that the more fresh content you create, the more forgiving members are on quality: four pieces a day and it needs to look pretty slick, but get closer to eight pieces a day and it really is fine filmed as a fly on the wall of the live class studio.

Indeed, unless you’re a large multi-site operation with the budget to build and run specialist digital production studios, our advice is that you focus on getting the most out of everything you already do – all that incredible content you’re already producing – by filming it and making it accessible via multiple platforms, both digital and physical.

This, really, is the vital mindset shift. You need to see all your content as, well… content. Don’t mentally place in-person content and digital content in different boxes. Live in-person classes and workouts, live-streamed and on-demand sessions with your in-house stars, on-demand content from third-party providers to ensure strength in depth.… It’s all simply content that pours into one central repository, from which your members can pull the experience(s) they want via whichever touchpoint they choose – whatever channel works for them that day.

“Hybrid isn’t just a project. It’s a new model in which digital is a key business division that must be resourced”

I’m not going to turn this into a big Wexer pitch, so all I’ll say for now is this: all it really takes is a shift in focus and a sprinkle of technology. All of the above can be achieved with our ecosystem of white labelled digital solutions. Please get in touch if you’d like to discuss the Wexer API, SDK, App, Web Player or in-club Wexer Virtual; whatever point you’ve reached in your process of digital transformation, we can help you start or continue your journey.

Create a win-win
Of course, your content creators could feasibly go online themselves, independently of your club; there are influencers out there making millions. But your in-house stars are unlikely to have the database, nor necessarily the business skillset to build one. They have the talent and the mass appeal, but not the platform.

Meanwhile, your club has the audience – your database of members – and the pressing need to become omnichannel to better serve that audience.

Which is, of course, where it all aligns perfectly, with money to be made all round – provided you create a win-win scenario for both club and superstar.

To keep your content creators contributing to your brand rather than their own, you must find ways to incentivise and reward them for the incredible contribution they make to your now omnichannel business. We have a number of clients who pay their stars more for content that drives high usage, for example.

Nurture your talent, too, encouraging them to rise into the starring role you and your members need them to occupy. Empower and incentivise them to promote the content they create with you among their followers; when content is your product, you sell your talent and your talent in turn sells you. Help them grow their profile at the same time as rewarding them for their role in your success, to ensure their ongoing loyalty to your brand even as their reach and appeal grows.

In short, recognise that their success is your success, but work hard to ensure they know the flip side is also true: that they will do better with you than on their own. As usage and revenue rises, your operation will have more to invest in content, meaning superstars continue to grow… and so the virtuous circle goes on.

Yet underpinning this is a simple but vital secret: you have to fully commit. Hybrid isn’t just a project. It’s a new model in which digital is a key business division – one that must be resourced and prioritised.

Indoor cycling in a content-led world

“Virtual classes have long been used to meet off-peak demand and reduce downtime in studios. Indoor cycling is no exception – and with Wexer technology now allowing clubs to stream their own self-produced content onto the big screens of their virtual studios, operators have a chance to create a real buzz around their group cycle offering,” says Bowman.

“The first step is upping the ante on your live classes to make each of them a truly special event that members waitlist to be a part of. You want every live cycling class to be packed, so you might even consider reducing the number of live classes.

“Then put a basic camera set-up in your group cycle studio and record all these incredible live classes, capturing the energy of the room as well as the carefully selected rockstar instructor.
Once recorded, this content can be scheduled to run in any slots that used to be live instructor-led, as well as being made available on-demand the rest of the time. Your own signature ‘wow factor’ cycle classes are suddenly available whenever members come into the club.

“And of course, use of this on-demand content isn’t limited to your cycle studio. The number of people who now have a cycling option at home amazes me; we’re putting more indoor cycling content onto our Mobile platform to meet demand, with cycling already accounting for around 8 per cent of class views. When you consider the equipment requirement and the 1,500 different classes available in our Mobile library, that’s pretty impressive.

“As a club, there’s great value to be had in creating your own indoor cycling content.”

The post Align Your Stars appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

Chances are it would be Peloton – and for good reason, with its millions of users and soaring revenues through lockdown. Things may have slowed down for the megabrand over recent months, but there’s nevertheless a huge global community that’s already invested in its bikes and become accustomed to the brand’s slick, customer-centric way of doing things.

And of course, Peloton is just one of a large number of brands that have entered the connected, at-home cycling space.

So, what does this mean for clubs and studios?

Positive return figures from operators around the world show demand is absolutely still there for the social, in-person experience; your group cycling fans from before lockdown will likely still be your group cycling fans now, provided your classes bring them value above and beyond what they can experience online.

Nevertheless, the future does seem to be hybrid, with these fans coming to your club or studio when it’s convenient and training from home when it isn’t.

But what about those individuals who weren’t members of a club before, who bought an indoor bike as their way of staying active during lockdown? And what about your returning members who didn’t previously do your (perhaps a little daunting) cycling classes, but who were drawn to the intimidation-free at-home cycling experience during the pandemic?

How do we get these indoor cycling newcomers into our studios and engaged with the in-person experience? Our panel of experts share their thoughts and advice.

Barbara den Bak

Founder, HIGH STUDIOS | CDO, Urban Gym Group

My thoughts on this topic come from my own lockdown experience.

In September 2021, we opened our first multi-studio, with our new concepts – HIGH FLOW hot yoga and HIGH RIDE indoor cycling – alongside our signature HIIT class, HIGH RUN. Then, almost immediately, we went into lockdown again.

We shot a few simple videos to offer all our members for free, and I had a bike in my house to test the RIDE concept. I immediately felt a huge experiential gap between the live class environment and a single instructor on-screen telling me what to do. I didn’t enjoy it.

I started looking around online and came across an incredible cycling instructor, Kristina Girod, who films classes from her studio in Arizona. The way she does it, you can see the whole room. The studio’s full of participants, the music’s amazing, she has a really powerful presence and you can feel the energy coming through the screen.

“During lockdown, I immediately felt a huge experiential gap between the live class environment and a single instructor on-screen telling me what to do. I didn’t enjoy it.”

It transformed not only my at-home experience but my feelings about indoor cycling generally. I’ve always been more of a HIIT girl – I initially found choreography on a bike hard – but doing Kristina’s classes at home has given me confidence. I feel ready for the studio.

But to actually get me – and others like me – into the studio, we have to show people what they’re still missing at home. We have to create FOMO. My experience of following a face-to-camera instructor? That won’t work. But seeing a really cool instructor leading an incredible class, feeling the energy, getting a sense of the additional motivation and advice you would get in-person… It makes you want to go in and do a class with them in real life.

So, this is my advice to clubs and studios: shoot classes for your digital channels – it doesn’t have to be expensive – and show the whole class. Pick your top instructors. Do everything you can to show how cool it is to be in your studio. Then share at least some of this content on your social platforms and website, not just with members.

I know some of the big studio cycling brands won’t do this – their classes go on behind closed doors – but I think it’s beneficial not only for your own studio but for studios around the world. I can’t go to Arizona to do Kristina’s class, but seeing her energy makes me want to find a studio locally that can give me a similar in-person experience. It will help us all if we put our energy out there.

“Share at least some of your content on your social platforms and website. It’s beneficial not only for your own studio but for studios around the world. It will help us all if we put our energy out there”

We will certainly do this for HIGH RIDE, and I have no fear that it will stop people coming to our studio – and potentially studios plural, as I can see us opening standalone HIGH RIDE and HIGH FLOW studios in the future. People will cycle at home as well, but we’re all too desperate to get out of the house for at-home workouts to replace in-person classes.

Another thing we do at HIGH STUDIOS which is very useful for newcomers is make it really clear on our website what to expect in class. We spotlight our trainers, their style and approach to choreography, even their playlists, so you can choose the exact in-person experience you want.

Finally, and this relates specifically to our multi-studio, we place a big emphasis on cross-promotion of classes. That includes training our instructors to cross-teach so, for example, they can encourage their HIIT fans to try a yoga class with them too. We also do special HIATHLON events – a 20-minute ride, 20 minutes of HIIT then 20 minutes of yoga. This crossover is also likely to bring new people into our cycling studios.

Emma Barry

Global fitness authority | Chief Creative Soul, Good Soul Hunting

“Live has got to get better. If I bother to be in the room, you had better bother to make it worth my while.”

Tune in to the global guru that is Emma Barry as she takes us through two caveats, five mega-trends and five calls-to-action to entice at-home cyclists to the in-club, in-person experience.

Expect pearls of wisdom on:

•  Reframing re-opening as opening for the first time
•  Embracing 2022 as the year of workout variety
•  Lifting our live game and dialling up the FOMO
•  Becoming social Pied Pipers, whereby ‘can’t’ becomes ‘can’

… and far, far more besides!

Set aside 10 minutes of your life to check out this video. Your business will love you for it!

Ben Karoonkornsakul

Founder & CEO, The Absolute Group

Alongside our studios in Bangkok and Singapore, we also offer at-home fitness: we sped up the launch of our Home Edition bike when lockdown hit and have sold or rented 700–800 bikes.

Around 60 per cent of the customers who have a Home Edition bike were members of our studios before the pandemic. They were already brand enthusiasts and wanted to continue to exercise with us even when they couldn’t leave the house. Our bike – with its integrated screen streaming Absolute content into their homes – was the perfect solution.

For this group, returning to our studios will happen naturally. In fact in Singapore, where the market is a little younger, all our classes are already over-subscribed. In Bangkok, people are still more fearful and are taking their time to return; we’re even seeing people making an experience of their home workouts, with groups of friends and family putting all their Home Edition bikes together in one of their houses to enjoy group rides!

But they know how great our in-person experiences feel. We’re confident that when the fear of COVID has finally gone, those who were members before will come back, settling into a hybrid pattern of both at-home and in-studio classes.

“We’ll create exclusive events for Home Edition members to come in and meet the instructors they’ve been training with on-screen for so many months, but never met in person”

The challenge is with the other 40 per cent: the Home Edition customers who became first-time riders during lockdown. Can these customers be migrated into our studios?

We certainly aren’t seeing many of them coming in yet. They feel safe at home and they don’t know what they’re missing, so they’re staying where they are.

Even longer term, it’s important to understand the motivations for purchasing our bike in the first place – including geography. In Thailand, our studios are all in Bangkok, which means people living elsewhere may never attend in person. They’ve chosen at-home cycling purely as a simple but effective class to follow on-screen. Absolute is a strong brand in our markets, so they’ve found their way to our bike. And commercially, as long as they continue to subscribe to Home Edition, that’s fine by us.

In fact, digital is set to become an even bigger focus for us as we finally get to trial our Absolute X hybrid club concept in Singapore. We believe there’s a huge market for virtual fitness, not least due to the shortage of good instructors, so Absolute X has a big virtual studio – including live streaming top classes from other Absolute studios – alongside in-person instruction. With this second distribution channel, we’re very happy to continue investing in high-quality digital content.

That said, when the time is right, we will try and encourage those in the 40 per cent group who live near our studios to experience an in-person class. We’ll offer lots of free trials and introductory discounts, not just for cycling but also for yoga and reformer pilates, giving people even more reasons to come in and experience the live ambience.

We’ll look at bundling Home Edition + studio memberships; use our Home Edition bike screens to show off our studio vibe; and use social media to drive awareness and understanding of how different in-person really is. We’ll also create exclusive events for Home Edition members to come in and meet the instructors they’ve been training with on-screen for so many months, but who they’ve never met in person. They’ll then do a special class with that instructor – a dedicated class just for Home Edition newcomers, so they don’t feel out of place.

As I say, if we can’t get all Home Edition members into our studios, commercially it isn’t a big deal. However, we know our studio environment, experience and community are big drivers of satisfaction and retention, so where relevant, we will try to engage them in-person too.

The post A New Cohort appeared first on Ride High Magazine.

What do I mean by that? Heart rate training has been around for many years and it’s an important and valid metric. It shows the intensity of your intention – how hard you’re trying to push yourself. That’s very useful for instructors in particular, allowing them to read the room and understand the effort each participant is putting in. With the addition of colour zones, it’s also easy to understand and can be very motivating in a class environment.

However, the issue is this: there are many factors that can impact someone’s heart rate. It isn’t exclusively a response to training. Yes, your heart rate could be high because you’re really pushing yourself in your workout. However, it could also be high because the room is too warm and you’re over-heating, you’ve had lots of caffeine, you’re stressed, or because of a number of other external factors.

In short, HR training tells you how fast your heart is pumping, but it doesn’t tell you why. It can also vary quite notably from day to day. Plus, heart rate zones are based on your max HR – a figure that doesn’t change as you get fitter. It means you can’t easily track or build on your progress.

How is power different?
Whether you’re in a studio or on the road in the rain, 200 watts is 200 watts. This is why I refer to power as the ultimate training dose: you can very precisely specify a number.

Let’s take the analogy of weight training. Month one, you might have 20kg on your bar. Next month it’s 30kg, a few months later it’s 50kg. The weight is your training dose and the rising number reflects the progress you’ve made. It’s the same with wattage: you can see your improved performance on the power meter of your bike as your output rises from 200 to 220 to 240 watts over time.

Then there’s a measure called FTP – functional threshold power – which is a great tool for a class environment. Every individual can calculate their personal FTP, which is directly related to their fitness level. Rather than specifying a wattage, an instructor can then specify an FTP percentage they want the class to ride at. In turn, this ensures every individual is working according to their current fitness level – but also at exactly the right load for the training goal.

I say ‘current’ because your FTP will rise as you get fitter. If there’s a day when you’re tired or stressed, you may not hit the same output as on a day when you’re fresh, but overall – over time – your FTP will increase as your fitness improves. That provides a great sense of accomplishment and motivation to keep going.

How does FTP work?
Your functional threshold power is the highest average power (wattage) output you can maintain for an hour, going as hard as possible for the whole hour. You then take that average wattage as 100 per cent and build your training zones around it.

Zone 1, active recovery, sees you cycling at 55 per cent or less of your personal FTP. It’s an important zone in every class and for every cyclist: it stops you training too hard and ensures you’re ready for the next effort.

“Every individual can calculate their personal FTP, which is directly related to their fitness level. An instructor can then specify an FTP percentage they want the class to ride at.”

Zone 2, endurance, is where you could spend all day cycling. You’re at 56–75 per cent of your FTP, and as the name suggests, it’s about improving your endurance.

Zone 3, tempo, is a zone most people could stay in for perhaps 30 minutes to a couple of hours – or eight hours if you’re a pro cyclist! You’re now working at 76–90 per cent of your FTP, and the benefit here is improved aerobic capacity and muscular endurance.

Zone 4 is your FTP zone, and this is the measure that really defines your fitness. It’s a bit like the one rep max in weight training: you quote your FTP to someone and it’s a shorthand for how fit you are. In this zone, you’re working at 91–105 per cent of your FTP, and translated to real world cycling it’s about how fast you can ride outside: with an FTP of 180 watts, you might be able to maintain 15mph; 220 watts and you’re looking at perhaps 20mph. Physiologically, it’s about improving overall cardiovascular fitness and the body’s ability to handle lactate in the blood.

Zone 5 – 106–120 per cent of FTP – is the VO2 max zone. We’re talking three- to eight-minute all-out efforts, as if you’re riding up a steep hill. You’re training your body’s ability to bring oxygen into the lungs and from there to the bloodstream and the muscles; your VO2 max is the efficiency with which your body can do this, and it can be improved with training.

Zone 6 is anaerobic capacity, spanning 121–300 per cent of FTP. We’re talking very intense intervals of perhaps 30 seconds to two minutes only, and it’s about improving your ability to produce energy without oxygen. Working in this zone brings a rounded approach to fitness.

Finally, anything above that is zone 7 – neuromuscular power. Think of it as your very best sprint for five to 15 seconds, which might typically be anything from 700–2,500 watts. This is pure muscular strength building.

How do you calculate FTP?
As I say, FTP is about going as hard as you can for an hour, but not everyone wants to do that – not even pro athletes! There are a few shortcuts, but I believe the best is a 20-minute test that you can run as a class.

You start with a 20-minute warm-up – or 10–15 minutes if you want the class to fit neatly into an hour’s slot – including 3 x one-minute fast pedals to wake up the legs.

Then you do five minutes cycling as hard as you possibly can to exhaust the body’s anaerobic capacity – something that could otherwise skew the results – before 10 minutes of recovery, cycling at around 65 per cent of your capacity.

“Test your FTP every eight weeks; fitness generally changes in eight-week cycles. To keep progressing, re-set training zones around your rising FTP.”

Only then do you do the 20-minute time trial, striking up a strong, steady wattage that you think you can maintain for 20 minutes; you can tweak as you go, because we take an average reading, so don’t start too hard! Your FTP is your power average for the 20 minutes, minus 3–5 per cent to even more accurately estimate what you could do in an hour.

The class ends with a cool-down of 10–15 minutes’ easy pedalling.

People often object – they say they’re tired by the time we do the time trial – but that’s the whole point. We’re trying to approximate what you could do in an hour, so you have to be a little fatigued when you begin the 20-minute test.

Crucially, you should re-test your FTP every eight weeks, because fitness generally changes in eight-week cycles. To keep progressing, you need to continually re-set your training zones around your rising FTP.

Do you always favour power training?
In a word, yes. It’s a great way to scale for everyone in the room, so they can train in the same zones and progress together but without having to achieve the same wattage.

It’s also possible to create classes around specific training objectives. “On Monday, our class will train the cardiovascular system with relatively low force; on Tuesday we’ll focus on improving our FTP, with 4 x 10 minutes at 95–105 per cent of FTP; Wednesdays will be all about improving anaerobic capacity, with short, hard efforts of 30 seconds to two minutes; Thursday’s class will focus on VO2 max, with three- to five-minute intervals, but we’ll throw in five muscular strength intervals first.” And so on.

Not every FTP zone is suitable for every level of fitness, though, so classes should be clearly labelled for their training objectives, benefits and level of experience required. Unfit beginners should focus on zones 1–3, for example, but note that it doesn’t get progressively harder from zone 1 up to zone 7: fitter beginners could do zone 7 and even zone 6, provided intervals aren’t too long and there’s plenty of variety in the class.

On the other hand, if you put a beginner straight into an FTP intervals class, I can pretty much guarantee they’ll never come back!

This is the beauty of power training, though. You know exactly what energy system you’re training – VO2 max or threshold power, for example – which is something other modes of training don’t allow for.

“How you create your wattage is important. In a general-purpose class, aim to push people out of their cadence comfort zones.”

Where does cadence (RPM) fit in?
Cadence can be a challenge for many people in a class, especially beginners who aren’t used to moving their leg muscles in a pedalling motion. At first, people generally want to pedal slower – perhaps 70–80 RPM – until they get used to it.

However, cadence is a very important metric, as power = force x cadence. You can produce 1,000 watts by cycling at a slow 40 RPM with the resistance cranked up to 20, or you could cycle at 150 RPM with the resistance at 5 and still produce 1,000 watts.

At face value, that may seem like the same outcome, but how you create your wattage is important: in this example, the 40 RPM approach is about producing the watts through force, which means you’re training muscular strength; the 150 RPM approach produces watts through speed and trains cardiovascular fitness.

When you teach a general-purpose indoor cycling class, you should aim to balance load between the muscles and the cardiovascular system. You need to push people out of their cadence comfort zones, helping endurance runners build muscle and weight lifters improve their cardiovascular fitness. You should also move people through the different FTP zones to work on strength, cardiovascular fitness and muscular endurance. This is how you use power training to improve all-round fitness.

Get in the zone

Monitoring your % FTP

If the key to effective indoor cycling is working to specified percentages of your personal FTP – well, how exactly do you do this? Easy, says Allen: with indoor cycling bikes now boasting advanced computers, you simply enter your personal FTP at the beginning of class and the console will show you what % FTP you’re hitting throughout the workout.

BODY BIKE Smart+ goes a step further. Believing that exercisers should have clear ownership of their personal data, and that operators should have future-proofed bikes, BODY BIKE got rid of integrated consoles around five years ago. In their place, an app that links seamlessly to any BODY BIKE Smart+ bike, transforming exercisers’ phones into portable consoles that can be upgraded with each app update, and that let exercisers carry their data with them.

The latest app update, launched in April, features in-saddle installation: simply pedal for 30 seconds and the upgrade is installed on your phone, bringing your previous training history across with it. Alongside a host of new features, including achievement-based status updates, are all the old favourites – not least a number of FTP features.

There are two FTP tests you can do on your own – a five-minute test and a burnout test – which, as BODY BIKE CEO Uffe A Olesen explains, “allow people to easily do a test themselves at any point, rather than having to wait for their club to run a class as Hunter suggests”. Alternatively, if you already know your FTP, you can simply store it in your personal app settings.

You then monitor your % FTP during class by tapping the middle of the wattage ‘target board’ to reveal your % FTP figure.

% FTP is just one of numerous metrics that can be tracked through the BODY BIKE Smart+ app, alongside % max HR, cadence, kilometres travelled, calories burned and workout duration.

The post Power Play appeared first on Ride High Magazine.