It’s always hard to find a form of exercise that you truly love and love enough to consistently commit to showing up. Cycling is that form of exercise for me. I starting going to a local cycling studio about 3 years ago and truly loved it. It’s a high energy cardio work out that get’s your heart pumping + what most people don’t realize is arm and ab circuits are also added in for a full body work out. The Peloton, a high end indoor stationary bike, has a cult like following (more than 500,000 members use the bike or app) and in today’s post I’m sharing why I choose to be one of those happy 500,000 members.

If you buy a Peloton because of me I would LOVE for you to use my unique referral code which is F8AUJW. When you place your order you will get $100 off accessories and I will receive a $100 referral reward of store credit. Thank you so much!

Convenience

While the instructors and energy of a cycle studio is amazing and a big part of what made me fall in love with cycling in the first place, convenience still ranks higher on my list. The convenience of not having to pack and unpack a gym bag everyday or worry about missing a favorite  instructor’s class because I wanted to sleep in or had to work late was a complete godsend. I live 40 minutes outside of the city which meant a very early wake up call a solid hour before a class would start. With almost all studio’s you are required to reserve your seat (which fill up fast) and if you need or want to cancel you must do so 12 hours before that class starts OR ELSE  you will be hit with the penalty of a late charge. I’m someone who like’s to work out in the morning to set the tone for my day and having the Peloton feet away from my bed is a major plus.

Live Classes + Instructors

There are more than 90 new classes offered every week that air live but are also recorded and saved to experience later if you can’t make it in live time. I love that the Peloton library of classes range from 5 to 90 minutes and from warm up to high intensity. There is a wide range of class ride themed music (90’s pop, rock, Live DJ, boy band, etc.) and difficulty levels (power zone, climb, low impact, intervals and arms, etc.) there’s truly something for everyone. The Instructors truly make these classes come to life and I think it’s just as good as attending an in person studio class. Ally Love, Cody Rigsby, Alex Toussain and Emma Lovewell are some of my favorite instructors.

Answering some FAQ’s that I’ve received via DM when sharing the Peloton on my Insta stories.

It’s an investment, is the cost worth it?

If you use it, yes. Definitely. We are paying $102 a month for two years without interest and $39 a month for the app/class subscription. We opted for the payment plan and use that as a motivator similar to how a monthly gym membership would. You can also just pay for the Peloton app and stream classes on your phone or iPad to watch on a bike or treadmill at the gym or if you aren’t ready to invest in the Peloton bike just yet and have a different indoor bike at home. The digital subscription will cost you $19.49/month and has other options as well including audio for outdoor runs, treadmill classes, bootcamp, cardio, strength and yoga. *In Kansas City a one month unlimited cycling membership for one person is $150/month. Don’t forget about $5 rental shoe fee, $15 late cancelation fee and $20 no show fee* 

Do you have to buy/use the Peloton shoes?

No, I bought these shoes + these cleats which are easy to install onto the shoes. You will want to make sure your shoe’s have cleats on the bottom or are cleat compatible to buy separately like I did for clipping into the Peloton.

Tell me about the screen/what all can you and others see?

The 22-inch HD flat screen  allows you to see your progress from every class including heart rate, resistance, cadence and output. It will show the length of the class including how much time is left along with the music that is playing including the name, artist or title of a song. The resistance that you are at, the recommended resistance that the teacher says to be on in case you didn’t hear it or forget, same with your cadence (rpm) and recommended cadence, your output (which is resistance plus cadence combined effort), speed, distance, and calorie are all shown. There is also a leaderboard that shows your ranking along with others who have taken the class or are taking the ride with you at the same time. You are able to hide all of these things if you want, I will almost always hide the leaderboard because I just don’t care where I and/or others rank, I’m there for me and competing against myself.  However my husband is the opposite and loves to compete with friends and see where he’s at on the board in general compared to others. After your workouts, you can checkout your profile which houses all the workouts you have completed along with stats from your ride like highest cadence, resistance, output and calories burned.

Is it easy to move? Is it loud?

We keep our Peloton in our living room and we’ll just move it to our spare bedroom or the garage when having people over, it’s very easy to move. The bike itself is not loud at all which is great if you have roommates/spouse and don’t want to wake them. You can also connect your headphones via bluetooth.

How do you add or find friends on Peloton?

To find your friends on the Peloton bike, select the Menu on the bottom right-hand corner of your touchscreen, then select Find Facebook Friends. To find friends on your web experience, log into your profile at the top right-hand corner of your screen on the Peloton website the new Here Now tab of the Leaderboard, you can see who’s riding at the same time as you in an On-Demand class, no matter where they are in the ride. Simply filter your Leaderboard from ‘All Time’ to ‘Here Now’ to see who else is riding with you. There is also a Facebook group for Peloton riders where you can connect with people and ride together.

I am so excited to share that from Dec 31st-Jan 31st I lost a total of 10LBS and 11.75 inches! I’m more impressed/surprised with the inches lost than pounds to be honest and it’s definitely a big motivator to keep going. I’ll continue to share monthly updates with y’all – 16 weeks until June 1, the summer countdown is on!

As always feel free to comment below, send an email or DM me on Instagram with any other questions you may have when it comes to the Peloton!