Hi-tech Exercise At Home With The Peloton Cycle
Finding time to get to the gym can be difficult when you have work and family commitments. Luckily, there are thousands of home gym products on the market which can help you stay fit in the comfort of your home at a time that suits you.
These products range from basic fitness DVDs and weights to much more hi-tech home exercise equipment, like the Peloton Cycle. Of course, exercise bikes are nothing new. They have been popular since the fitness boom of the 1980s, but the Peloton Cycle is an exercise bike for the 21st century.
The company behind the Peloton Cycle was launched in 2013 and has been developing and improving its top-of-the-range models ever since. Taking their name from a cycling term more at home in the Tour de France — the peloton is the name given to the main pack of cyclists in a road race — the Peloton Cycle itself is a great at-home exercise bike whether you enjoy high energy spinning classes or something at a more leisurely pace while you build up your levels of fitness.
Connect with Live Classes
The real unique selling point of the Peloton Cycle is connectivity. It has a 21″ sweat-resistant touch-screen fitted as standard and can connect to wi-fi in your home to allow you to take part in live spin classes broadcast several times a day from Peloton’s own spin studio in New York, or choose from a pre-recorded class if you have a favorite instructor or if there is no live class when you want to exercise.
You can even choose between English and Spanish language classes, and Peloton Cycle is looking to add other languages all the time as they plan to expand across Canada and Europe.
These spin classes are high octane and high energy, with loud music and lots of encouragement from the class instructors. They are not for the faint-hearted but are great if you want to get that heart-rate pumping and tone your legs and your core. If you find a class too hard, you can always alter the resistance settings on your Peloton Cycle and work up to the tougher settings as you build up your fitness.
And if you live in New York or are visiting and are a big fan of the Peloton Cycle spin classes, you can actually visit the studio itself to see a class in action, or even take part in one of their live broadcasts. The filming equipment used in the Peloton studio is top notch too, ensuring that you enjoy excellent visuals on your 1080-pixel screen.
Peloton Cycle Basics
While the connectivity and access to live and recorded spin classes is a great selling point, the bike itself has to be functional and effective if you are to enjoy using it and if you are to see an improvement in your fitness.
The bike itself comes with an adjustable seat, pedals with cleat locks — essential for some of those high-intensity spin class moves — and the resistance control is within easy reach, allowing you to make easy adjustments (either up or down) during the classes.
The touch screen is easy to use, with classes easy to find from the main menu. It also records all the usual exercise bike statistics such as distance, cadence and calories burned, helping you monitor your achievements and your progress over time.
How Much Does It Cost?
All this hi-tech equipment doesn’t come cheaply, but you do get a great deal for your money. The Peloton Cycle itself costs around $2,000 and you can just pay that one-off fee and use it as a regular exercise bike.
However, if you want to get the most out of this system, it is worth paying the subscription fee for access to the live and recorded spin classes. This subscription costs $40 per month — less than the average gym membership (though this doesn’t take into consideration the initial outlay for the cycle).
The Peloton Cycle is not the bargain option for home exercise cycles and is probably not the ideal model for someone who is planning to use their home bike to take a few gentle “rides” a few times a week without really breaking into a sweat.
If you have already tried spin classes and loved them, or if you have enjoyed other high-impact, high-intensity workouts, then this is the home exercise system for you; quality equipment, great workouts and constantly updating classes to keep you interested and engaged.
