Jump to: Before Bicycles Were Accepted
Today's Groupon gets you five cycling classes at Crank Indoor Cycling Studio, a cycleland inside the Aire Urban Performance Cooperative. The clean and spacious studio has state-of-the-art cycles that mimic a real road ride for a heart-pumping, calorie-cutting, really nice workout.
Crank's classes (offered Tuesday through Friday at several times throughout the day) are more focused and organized than a typical gym spin class. (Click here and type Crank into the client finder to see the schedule.) Take the threshold power class to burn a huge amount of calories in a blaze of fiery, endurance-increasing cycling; a Wake Up! Cycling Class at 6 a.m. for a motivational morning ride; a quick workout during the lunch hour to keep lunch foods guilt-free; or a post-work pedal to shake off employment glum. Since you reserve your spot online beforehand, you'll never be fighting over a cycle with rusty bike chains.
Crank Cycling has men’s and women’s locker rooms and provides sweat towels for all class participants. You pedal on state-of-the-art Saris PT300 cycles, which can measure your workout in real time, including watts and heart rate, as well as get an accurate measure of calories burned. The studio has an 1,000-watt sound system and a 50-inch plasma TV playing music videos, cycling videos, slideshows of bike tours in Italy, and scenes from the cycling episode of Band of Brothers.
Though it just opened in August, Crank Cycling is getting attention on Yelp, with an average 4.5 stars. All the instructors are experienced cyclists who strive to make the class seem as if it were a real road ride. It's like going for a jaunt with a bunch of fitness friends who joyfully race, sprint, and zip across the open road or up open hills, except that there are no potholes, swarms of gooey gnats, devastating surprise curbs, blinding rain, and rusty derailleurs. Indoor cycling is the perfect heart-pounder for competitive athletes, fitness enthusiasts, and anyone who wants to lose weight, improve his or her 20K time, or ride a bicycle extremely fast indoors.
Before Bicycles Were Accepted
It’s hard to imagine, but there was once a time when the bicycle was not considered a feasible means to achieve fitness goals. Just read this excerpt from the July 1922 issue of Athletical Fitnessarian Magazine:
Bi-cycles used to improve fit-ness? Impossible! What’s next? Aeroplanes used to de-liminate ailments of the heart and lung? Most preposterous, I’m afraid, dear readers.
The spurious claims of the dual-wheeled traveling contraption-makers, of improved body-condition arising from under-torso-powered pedaled motions, are entirely unproven and are likely a “Red” plot to undermine war efforts current and expected.
Reader, ask your-self: Other than gratitude to your well-heeled perceptive capacities, what emotion have you sensed when ending a journey by bi-cycle that no ailments have befallen you on your dangerous travails? Shrewd and wisely skeptical fitnessarians would do well to avoid seeking vigor-enhancements by means of bi-cycle.
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