Spinning (Indoor Cycling) Classes

jyl · jyl's Garage

I recently started going to a spinning (indoor cycling) class at a small gym near my house.

At first, I liked the energy and the scenery, but thought the class wouldn't make me a stronger rider. We went almost the entire hour standing, "climbing" at 100+ rpm, with breaks to pedal backwards, do pushup on the bars, jump in and out of the saddle every two pedal revolutions, etc.

I've since started modifying the routine to better approximate how I actually ride a road bike. I don't know about you guys, but to climb a hill I don't stand and spin up at 100+ rpm in 34/32. What is the point of training in a "gear" that I don't even have on my bike?

So I figured out what resistance on the spin bike approximates climbing at 70-80 rpm in 39/21, and I push that seated, or I increase resistance to simulate 39/17 and push it standing. I ignore all the un-bicycling stuff - bar pushups, etc. My heart rate is 155-160 almost the whole hour. I usually start to cramp up in the calves and have to ride through it. I sweat like an oinker. Oddly, I don't get out of breath like I would if I were pushing hard up that hill for real.

Now I'm finding my spin classes both fun and, I think, useful.

Anyone here do spin classes? Do you find them useful for winter cycling training? Will I have to turn in my man card for doing this?

mikeferg75 · mikeferg75's Garage

My wife is a spin instructor, I do her's in winter months as race training.

She does not do any of the "non cycling" related things like push ups, ect, her classes are very real, and very useful.

Try another instructor, but as you figured out, you have to make the classes work for you.

look 171 · 11-08-2012, 07:49 PM

Hey John, here's what the tough Belgian boys do in those wet cold winter months. Spin, spin, spin. Eddy Merckx spinning on his rollers at home - crazy high cadence! - YouTube

I don't think one can improve their climbing all that much on rollers or a stationary bike. Way back in the dark ages, I remember reading something about living in the fly over states without hills. They suggest top gear and off the saddle riding to simulate hill climb.

If you spin at 120-130 for an hour, it will work you. I suppose you can pound a large gear and work that way also. An hour of turbo trainer=20 min. top half an hour of road work.

Years ago, I did a couple of spinning classes only to discover the push ups and and riding at 30 rpm on and off the saddle along with the dance music was just a dance on the bike. I found no real benefit from the actual class. So, off the spinning like crazy I go on that thing.

look 171 · 11-08-2012, 07:52 PM

Super Fast !! - YouTube

No handle bar push ups here in this cycling school. I might have posted this link before.

cantdrv55 · 11-08-2012, 08:00 PM

Yes, I take Spin classes whenever I can. The young female instructors at our club love doing "jumps" and push ups. They were fun at first but so far removed from actual cycling so now I only attend classes that are taught by my fellow local bike club members. When it's wet out, I have to get to the gym a half hour early or there won't be a seat for me. I find it very helpful for aerobic fitness but not for building stamina or for toughening the hide I need on my arse for a six hour ride.

jyl · jyl's Garage

What I need to work on is endurance when pushing a climb. My aerobic capacity is better than my legs, I run out of legs before I run out of lungs. So my best option is usually to gear down and spin. But on hills I sometimes don't have that option, depending on the bike I take the rear only goes to 21T. So on longer climbs I have to sit there and push resistance, my legs expire while my heart and lungs are fine. That's why I'm trying to keep the resistance turned higher and pedal a lower cadence.

look 171 · 11-08-2012, 11:08 PM

John, I ride a 21x39 also. On a long climb, I have to power through it and my lung is beating out of my chest. I am on and off the saddle (relief, use a different set of muscles) and dance on the bike a little until I am tire and seat my fat arse back down and power some more. As I get older, the raw power from this tired engine just isn't there anymore to bang big ring up a long hill.

Sit back on the saddle 1/2 inch and work those thigh and calf muscles. I don't think there is a simpler way but grit your teeth and power up. Keep going up the same hill and soon enough, you will see improvements. I don't know how long is the hill, but we use to do intervals for short burst over hills. Our target was turn the gas on so we can drop other riders during a race on the 1/4 to 1/2 mile up hill sections. We find some half mile gradual hill and go up it at 90% (sprinting at a gear you are comfortable with) off the saddle. turn around (rest, cost down) and sprint up it again sitting down only and go about 90%. Each week, we would do 5 sets of each then go off for a good ride after. Every early season, those would hurt really bad. By mid summer, they hurt just as bad, if not worst because we were pushing a much larger gear by then, but we know were were getting a lot stronger. in the mean time, the 4-5 mile hills were still a must on the weekly program. IMO, the only way to get stronger in the hills is to keep climbing it. I am not sure how much the spinning classes will help with building climbing muscles? They help somewhat, because it is still seat time.

D911SC · D911SC's Garage

Quote:

Originally Posted by jyl

What I need to work on is endurance when pushing a climb. My aerobic capacity is better than my legs, I run out of legs before I run out of lungs. So my best option is usually to gear down and spin. But on hills I sometimes don't have that option, depending on the bike I take the rear only goes to 21T. So on longer climbs I have to sit there and push resistance, my legs expire while my heart and lungs are fine. That's why I'm trying to keep the resistance turned higher and pedal a lower cadence.

A really effective strength exercise is setting the resistance as high as you can go and maintain 60rpm seated for a 5 minute interval. As you gain strength and conditioning you can build from 4 reps to 5 and then 6. Initially you can have a 1:1 effort/recovery time ratio but then reduce this as you progress. 6 x 5 mins with 3 min recovery is a killer but you need to build up to it.

If you have reasonable condition and you are putting in enough effort you will be totally spent after a session like this.

You should see real benefit in about 4 weeks, doing this 2 or 3 times per week with recovery rides in between. The best results are always when you are consistent in your training.

Laneco · 11-09-2012, 03:43 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mikeferg75

My wife is a spin instructor, I do her's in winter months as race training.

She does not do any of the "non cycling" related things like push ups, ect, her classes are very real, and very useful.

Try another instructor, but as you figured out, you have to make the classes work for you.

Bingo. Alot of "spin" instructors don't ride. You can tell a few minutes into the class if they ride or not by the dipstick manuevers they are having you do. You don't do push-ups on a bike. You don't climb for an hour standing in the pedals. Not even in the tour de france. If you are climbing and need to accelerate, you jump up, or to give a muscle group a break.

I've had a GREAT spin instructor who did ride. Fabulous workout that made me stronger/faster on the bike. I went back to the gym a few weeks ago and the good instructor was long gone. Another lady was there. Yep... pushups on the handlebars, bouncing in the seat, and worst of all was the backward pedaling. I could not figure out why the bikes were in such bad repair. I went through SEVEN bikes before I found one without slack in the drivetrain or pedals that were unscrewed on the right side. After class, I tried to explain to her privately that you can't pedal backwards because the bike's right side is reverse thread to TIGHTEN as you pedal and UNTIGHTEN if you go the other way. She said "that doesn't make any sense."

last class with her.

Want your as$ truly well and thoroughly kicked? Get a video set called SUFFERFEST.

angela

MarkRobinson · 11-09-2012, 07:28 AM

Love spin classes, great workout, 0 equipment to purchase other than a pair of shoes/cleats, great looking girls, no sun damage, no worry about getting hit by cars, great way to dodge post-work traffic.

I go 2-3x a week usually.

look 171 · 11-09-2012, 07:36 AM

Anyone try those expensive computer controlled, road simulated stationary units? How close are they to riding on the road?

jyl · jyl's Garage

What we need in Portland is an indoor velodrome.

look 171 · 11-09-2012, 07:26 PM

Indoors? Real men ride in an outdoor velodrome in the rain. Let see them boys do a track stand on a 30 degree banking in the wet. After all, we go to the track too see crashes not racing.

No help with climbing there.

jyl · jyl's Garage

The rain is why I'm in the "spin studio" in the first place!

look 171 · 11-09-2012, 08:36 PM

I agree, no fun riding in the rain. I use to love getting caught in a rain storm(so cal rain, how much can it be?) and make the others suffer who disllike doing it. In my old age, I don't even like walking out in the rain to my car. I know how you feel.

Jeff

jyl · jyl's Garage

A warm summer rain, mmmm, nice.

Rain at 35F, brrrrr, not so nice.

I ride in the damn stuff every single weekday at 5:15 am, and as the winter wears on, I am going to get grumpier and grumpier about it. Until around February when it will seem completely normal to head out into freezing darkness and rain dressed like a spaceman in impervious gear from head to toe. I'll even be cheerful about it.

The thing about wearing all that stuff is, it only works if you are not riding too hard. Once you start to sweat, it gets miserable in the spacesuit. Yeah the jacket has zippered venting but the necessary fleece layers underneath don't (or they don't line up with the jacket vents), and they don't make rain pants with venting (which is weird, seems like right behind the knees would work). You either get soaked from the outside or from the inside.

So I haven't found anyway to ride hard, like training rides, in cold rain without getting soaked and usually chilled.

If anyone has figured out the secret sauce of what to wear in those conditions, I am very interested.

Laneco · 11-10-2012, 04:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by look 171

Indoors? Real men ride in an outdoor velodrome in the rain. Let see them boys do a track stand on a 30 degree banking in the wet. After all, we go to the track too see crashes not racing.

No help with climbing there.

The Alpenrose velodrome in Portland is 43 degrees. I've ridden it dry, and to be honest, I'm not entirely sure I could ride it at all if it was wet...

It would really be nice to have a covered velodrome in Oregon. Better yet if it was in SOUTHERN Oregon!

angela

look 171 · 11-10-2012, 02:31 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Laneco

The Alpenrose velodrome in Portland is 43 degrees. I've ridden it dry, and to be honest, I'm not entirely sure I could ride it at all if it was wet...

It would really be nice to have a covered velodrome in Oregon. Better yet if it was in SOUTHERN Oregon!

angela

Oh, I was being a smart ass about riding the track in the wet. Not possible, really. Years ago we sneaked into the Encino velodrome on a long ride when the wet stuff came down because we knew no one was there. We were screwing around, as we got going both of us were mopping the steep embankment with our shorts. there is no way to stay up there in the wet.

pavulon · 11-10-2012, 04:16 PM

I'm thinking of starting a summer snow shoveling class...

John Rogers · 11-10-2012, 08:33 PM

I am not sure if they are still made but if they are, get a set of rollers. The bike sits on them with no attachment and you have to learn to pedal evenly in a 360 degree pedal movement or you'll fly off. A good RPM to shoot for is 200 to 220 steady in top gear. Once you have that mastered, then try riding with no hands on the bar and getting some food out of the rear pocket and eat it and then you will be smooth. Back in the 1980s when I was racing with the LaJolla cycling club, we used to take triathletes and work them into this and within a month they would knock minutes off their bile times! Unfortunately this helps mostly for flats but out here on the west coast there are not a lot of big hills anyways!

I remember about 6 months before the 1984 LA olympics, a college on the east coast came up with some sensors that fit inside the cycling shoes that measured the force from the foot both down and up. Mark Gorski tried them out and found they showed he had nearly perfect rotation and he won the sprint gold medal!