I first wrote about the Peloton back in 2017. At the time, it was still very new. Nowadays, it seems everyone and anyone has or at least wants a Peloton, which has become a household name. Having had my bike for a while, here are 10 tips that might help you get the most out of your new Peloton bike.
1. Make sure you have the right shoes
This is the most basic tip, and something you probably already know if you have had your bike for any length of time. To properly ride, you need shoes that “clip in” to the pedals. The reason is that, many times, you will be riding so fast that if your foot came loose from the pedal it could result in injury. There is a cage-pedal option, for riders who want to ride with street shoes, but, if you really want the most out of your Peloton bike, just clip in.
2. Don’t beat yourself up if you are at the bottom of the leaderboard
The true competition is not with the rest of the users on the leaderboard but with yourself. Focus on you and your own progress. I like to look at the list of my rides in the app and compare my total output to see if it increases on average. If I take a leave of absence from the bike, my output is going to decrease. But if I focus and really work hard by riding every single day for a month, you better believe that my output — and overall strength — will increase. If you want to really compete with yourself, focus on your personal record (PR), which brings me to my next point.
3. Don’t worry if you can’t beat your PR
Sometimes I look at my PR and wonder who was using my bike to get such a crazy high number. PRs are not designed to be beat every day. And many times, when I do make a new PR, I do it by accident, unexpectedly; it’s almost never planned. The circumstances and conditions need to be right. For example, did I get enough sleep the night before? What did I eat and how is my energy level? Another condition is the type of ride. I tend to have a higher output when my resistance is higher, which is normally found in climb rides. I also do much, much better when I am motivated by the music. If the music is not my favorite, I might just plod along, but when my favorite songs come on, I speed up naturally. Just realize, you are not going to beat your PR every day. However, on those days when you do reach a new personal record, celebrate your achievement!
4. Learn to love the library on the Peloton bike
When I first started I was all about the live rides. However, when the pandemic decreased live-ride options, it forced me and many others to learn to love doing rides from the library. If your goal is to be ride with the community, there are often plenty of others taking the recorded rides — sometimes more so than when the ride was live.
5. Embrace the Peloton community
If you don’t have any friends who ride a Peloton bike, you can make new friends. There are several Facebook groups, including Peloton‘s official group, which, at the time of this writing, had 372,200 members. You can search for “Peloton” on Facebook and browse through all the groups. There are groups for women riders, riders who are moms, riders who also have a tread, riders who also row, riders who are teachers, riders who like certain instructors, etc. The total number of groups is countless. Find two or three groups that work with your personality and engage. Working out is more fun if you have a group motivating you.
6. Join challenges and collect badges
The challenges in the app are are there to motivate you, and when you complete one, you get a badge. You collect your badges in your profile. It is simple, and it’s something many other apps and platforms do, but it still works. When I see, for example, that I only need to do one more ride to get an award, I have a little more motivation to ride that day.
7. Don’t get attached to one instructor
I made this mistake during my first few months of having the bike. At the time, my favorite was Stephen T. Little. He was a serious and committed athlete, and super encouraging and motivating. In fact, he was the only one of the instructors whose fans referred to as “Coach” — Coach Little. I also really liked his laid-back personality. So I always rode his rides. But one day he left Peloton unexpectedly, and it was actually a little upsetting. Here, there was this person I looked forward to work out with every other day, and he suddenly was gone. It actually caused me to lose motivation.
Since then, however, I’ve learned to appreciate the range of Peloton’s many great instructors. When I find myself favoring one too much (because it does happen), I choose a ride with another instructor. By rotating instructors regularly, I don’t get too attached to one over the other. I also get a more diverse experience on the bike. After all, everything is impermanent, including Peloton instructors.
8. Expand your experience with non-bike classes
In Peloton’s earlier days, it had a small section of “beyond the ride“ rides. That section has since grown greatly to include strength training, yoga, meditation, stretching, waking, running, and even bootcamps. I honestly did not give these other workouts a chance until I joined the Pelothon 2020 challenge, and, in order to get a Pelothon 2020 badge I was forced to take a class with instructors who were non-bike. I was happy to discover Rebecca Kennedy, who has great strength-training workouts.
9. For a real challenge, consider the ‘tour’
Formerly Tour de Peloton, the tour is a brand that that organizes multiple “tours” for a community of Peloton athletes. Each tour features rides stacked one on top of each other, such as, for example, combining several rides of different lengths (some 10, 15, 20, or 30 minutes) to make one long ride, with no breaks. Many tours have themes or are focused on only one instructor. The smaller tours are just about two hours, but some longer, more challenging tours, are much more. There is a Facebook group where are you can team up with others to do the tour at exactly the same time and high-five each other throughout, then post about your achievements afterward. It is incredibly motivating. I myself have only done a few of the two-hour tours. When I did, though, I felt a huge sense of accomplishment and really increased my athletic abilities.
10. Consider My Virtual Mission
My Virtual Mission is an app that lets you set up your own virtual fitness challenges based on the map of the world. You can create a virtual truck anywhere on the map by picking a start point, and then an end point, and the app will create a route for you along the roads. You can give yourself a time limitation, such as a month or six weeks, and keep track of your progress each day. Walking, running, rowing, and other exercises are also counted toward your progress. As you continue on the Mission, you can explore where you’ve landed via Google Street view. It is a fun way to “travel” the world from your Peloton bike.
For my first mission, I set up a 130-mile track from Dublin to Galway, Ireland, and committed to achieving it within one month. Looking at my progress on the map really motivated me to ride at least 30 minutes a day to accumulate more miles. The website also has special events labeled “The Conquer,” for which you can purchase packages that including cool medals and T-shirts, as if you were participating in a real road race.
