How many times have you heard “I can’t do that” when it comes to trying a new fitness routine or piece of equipment? Okay lower your hands, we see you! One RealRyder studio owner and instructor is tackling the “can’t” and taking away the FEAR (yes, we said it!) many people have when it comes to indoor cycling. Posted on the walls of her studio: The only one who can tell you “you can’t” is you. And you don’t have to listen!
Lisa Flood Wisentaner opened Nantucket Cycling Studio in March of this year and is already being asked “When are you adding more classes?” and “When are you adding more bikes?” from her clients. Lisa’s approach is one of the many reasons her clients return and people continue to seek her out. She removes the element of fear from indoor cycling with her innovative 5-week Beginner series.
Many studios offer introductory classes, but Lisa wanted to take a slightly different approach, building a community for people trying indoor cycling or RealRyders for their first time. Clients sign up for a 5-week program that breaks down the class, adding 5 minutes of class time each week, working together toward their first full length class.
The first and second classes focus on the basics – setting up the bike to their individual measurements, learning how to control resistance, finding balance on the bike and a few more concepts. The classes progress to the more abstract ideas that only an experienced, RealRyder® Certified Instructor, like Lisa, can provide: learning your rate of perceived exertion, how to build your relationship with the bike and progress into your “zone” during a workout session. Every class starts with a review of the previous class and builds progressively with each session. After their “graduation” from the beginner series, “fears” and “can’t” no longer exist in participant’s exercise lexicon.
There’s also the elements of camaraderie and the accountability created when people begin a program together. Lisa knows her customers from the beginning and they look forward to progressing their workouts with her. And for the Nantucket Cycling Studio Ryders, Lisa has placed an order for more RealRyder bikes and is adding a new instructor and classes to the schedule.
How do you remove the fear and take away the “can’t” for potential clients and students?
RealRyder is hard at work on its installments featuring studios across the United States that have taken their indoor cycling studios to the next level (see our first installment on Real Ryder Revolution in metro-Detroit Michigan). What is their secret to selling out cycling classes, creating waiting lines and leaving their customers hungry for more? Watch the second part of this installment, featuring Qi Ryders, to learn more about the secrets to their success!
“Every month has been better than the last.”
“In 5 months I’ve never had one class not sell out.”
“Customer retention has been easy. We just put them on the bike.”
“RealRyders provide 100% more benefit – to everything.”
Qi has an incredible story in terms of its business success, but the classes featuring RealRyder® ABF8 bikes have also changed the lives of their participants. Below we have the story of how RealRyder changed the life of one of Qi’s top trainers and their Boxing Director, Nick Spinosa.
Nick has been on his feet for most of his life, growing up working his family’s restaurant in Pennsylvania. As an avid athlete, Nick played many sports – baseball, football, basketball – and continued to play baseball at the collegiate level at Penn State. He also developed a love and passion for boxing, which runs in his family. Nick’s grandfather was a professional boxer.
Nick’s love of sports and time spent on his feet caught up with him. During his collegiate years, while playing both baseball and boxing, Nick had to undergo surgery for damages to his feet, also dealing with arthritis pains from being on so many surfaces. Surgeons had to fuse the bones of his feet together in a series of surgeries. Three surgeries, in fact. Not an easy thing to swallow for an active person. And that wasn’t the end.
Following college, two additional surgeries (for a total of 5 surgeries on his feet!) the newly-minted kineseology grad headed out west to live with his brother in Denver, Colorado. Nick said he could barely walk or bend over when he arrived in Colorado in early 2010. It was time to get back in form. His brother proceeded to introduce him to Chris Lindley, one of the co-owners of Qi.
The two hit it off immediately, bonding over boxing and the Army-style workouts Chris provided at Qi. Enter the RealRyders at Qi. Nick was re-learning to walk when RealRyders arrived at Qi, and with the RealRyder® ABF8′s, he was able to accomplish his goals of walking again, becoming physically active and shedding weight gained over multiple surgeries. Nick is now 60 pounds lighter, teaching at least 13 filled or sold out classes a week and directs the Boxing programs at Qi. Nick’s personal triumph is one of the many stories we are proud to highlight and share. Qi continues to make an impact in the Denver community and on the lives of its participants and employees.
Do you have a story to share? We would love to feature your story on RealRyder’s blog!
We wish we could bottle up and sell the excitement that comes with trying RealRyder for the first time! The smiling faces tell the story – check out these photos from the past weekend’s SCW Fitness MANIA in Philadelphia!
RealRyder + SCW's Philadelphia MANIA
RealRyder + SCW's Philadelphia MANIA
RealRyder is relatively new on the fitness block. Our history stems from the stationary bike – a rigid, locked-down pedaling machine. And its basic design still hasn’t changed much after twenty years. Enter the RealRyder® ABF8: you get a true sense of the road with its unique, articulating frame that allows it to steer, lean, and feel like an actual road bike.
We know how difficult it is to go back to your stationary bikes after you’ve tried RealRyder! That first time you try it and you feel yourself moving beyond pedaling; the steering, the leaning, the balancing, the mental involvement, and the emotional excitement. You’ll want to replicate that experience in all your indoor cycling classes!
Our mission is to share RealRyder with as many people as we can! Maybe we should put the bikes on a bus and tour this great nation, calling ourselves The RealRyder Rockstars! Or maybe we’ll just stick with what we’re good at – trade shows and fitness conventions, where we get to interact with rockin’ fitness professionals and club owners!
RealRyder will continue to be at great events all over the country this year! Check out some of the great events we’re participating in, like SCW Fitness’ Mania Conventions and the The International Health, Racquet & Sportsclub Association (IHRSA), just to name a few!
Have you recently tried RealRyder? Have you been teaching for a year? Or more? We would love to hear your experience or memories with RealRyder (the title of the post!). Please share your thoughts and stories!
A new year, a new decade and a new era of indoor cycling! How were your holidays? Did you eat and drink too much? Did you pick your New Year’s Resolutions and if yes are you still sticking to them?!
I had a little chuckle this morning listening to the radio in the car and they were talking about people who had already broken their resolutions! My favorite was a lady who resolved to give up cussing, which lasted until the morning of January the 1st!!
According to the University of Scranton 36% of people making resolutions have fallen off the program after only a month, but surprisingly 46% of people making resolutions keep going for six months or longer. Motivation and commitment clearly play a big part in this especially with fitness and weight loss resolutions. This is where RealRyder and our unique form of indoor cycling comes in!
Losing weight is the most popular resolution, with getting fit not far behind and indoor cycling is a great form of cardio which will help you achieve either goal.
Top 10 New Year’s Resolutions
1.Lose weight
2.Manage debt/save money
3.Get a better job
4.Spend more time with family
5.Quit smoking
6.Eat right/Get fit
7.Get a better education
8.Reduce stress
9.Going greener
10.Volunteer to help others
Why RealRyder Indoor Cycling?
Why is RealRyder different to indoor cycling on any other bike? Simply, because it will give you a much more complete stationary bike workout and even more importantly it will keep you more motivated because our bike is more fun to ride!
On the first point the RealRyder’s unique articulating frame leans from side to side and creates a much more dynamic full body workout, by recruiting your core and upper body.
Other forms of indoor cycling really only work your legs and lungs. Studies have shown that indoor cycling on a RealRyder stationary bike will burn approximately 20% more calories than on other indoor bikes!
On the second point, our bike really is more fun to ride!
This is not just our opinion or some marketing claim, if you take a moment to look through our blog there are many testimonials from people of all levels of fitness. From instructors and top cyclists to novices the message is incredibly consistent RealRyder is more fun and once people have tried one they don’t want to go back to their old, non-moving indoor cycling bikes!
So if your resolutions include weight loss and fitness try our version of indoor cycling and give yourself a better chance of sticking to your resolutions once the initial enthusiasm wanes. Don’t just slog away on a boring pedaling machine it’s a new year, a new decade and a new era of indoor cycling!
Earlier this month we were at the SCW show Boston MANIA running our popular indoor cycling classes. This was the last SCW event of the year and a chance for New England to see the hottest innovations in fitness equipment and training.
We are always looking for feedback on what people think of our version of indoor cycling and the Boston audience didn’t let us down. We could tell you, but we’d rather let them tell you in their own words – the next era of cycling is here!
Some great testimonials and quotes! We regularly talk about RealRyder introducing a new era of indoor cycling and how our stationary bike is more realistic, but it is still reassuring to us when we hear it from the riders!
“It was incredible!” (RealRyder Indoor Cycling)
“Works your body much more than a Spinning® bike!”
“Riding indoors can get a little mundane and boring………this is definitely not mundane and boring – it’s exciting, it’s rad!”
“Closest thing to an outside bike.”
“Even with the learning curve, it was fun!”
“You won’t go back to a stationary bike!”
Boston is an ideal venue for this time of year, winter is coming in the North and for many outdoor cyclists, thoughts are now turning to spending more time indoor cycling. Our version of the indoor bike is equally at home as a more exciting alternative to the usual spin bikes or bike trainers.
Our favorite quote on the video is the last one:-
“Get off the old bike, get on the new and move into the future!”
Change up your indoor cycling classes or get your own RealRyder for training this winter – you won’t be disappointed. Welcome to Indoor Cycling 2.0! Time to take the training wheels off!
