I guess this is what the thumbnail of one of my rides would look like if I was a Peloton instructor.

(Sunday Paper, Year VI, Issue 15)

Back when we used to actually go to the gym, I used to really like riding the XPresso bike.

Riding the bike was a break from running, and it was fun because it saved your history under a username and if you had ridden a course before, it gave you a ghost version of yourself on the screen so you could compare your current ride against your previous rides.

It never would have occurred to me that it was possible to own a machine like that.

But things are certainly different these days.

We got a piece of mail back in the early winter advertising The Mirror - a wall unit that played workouts, I think, that you did as though you were looking in a mirror.

I was intrigued so I showed it to Kathy, and she told me she had been exploring a Peloton bike.

She explained to me what that was all about, and I said let’s go for it.

We lucked out because we ordered it in early December and the delivery was delayed once, but nothing like the delays other people experienced - we had our bike by New Year’s Day. (Other people waited months. It was in the news. You can read about it there.)

I am glad we didn’t have to wait months…because it has been an outstanding purchase.

The bike is one thing - I had never taken a spin class before but it turns out I need that structure of someone telling me how hard to pedal for however long to make sure I’m working out and not just leisurely riding.

But the app is a whole other thing. I have done a better job of stretching, I do strength workouts, I feel like I’m overall a lot stronger because of the core workouts I’ve been doing….ladies and gentlemen, I’ve even finally tried yoga.

And to top it all off there are running workouts that help keep me disciplined when I’m out for a run.

If you’re considering a Peloton and you don't know if you’ll like it I would recommend you start with the app. Do some of the workouts. I think I’d love the app by itself without even the bike.

But I like the bike too.

I like the fact that they keep track of my workouts, I like that I can build streaks, I like that they sent me an e-mail around the time I did my 50th bike ride that said they would send me a shirt when I got to 100! (I don’t like that their apparel is insanely highly priced.)

They’re not paying me for this. (Although it would be wonderful if they did. I’d gladly take money to rave about Peloton every week. I could be a Peloton influencer!) I’m just in great shape and feeling really good about it because of the workouts I’ve been doing through the Peloton.

I guess my next frontier is adding some friends. If you’re on Peloton and want to connect, I’d love to do so.

I’m PeloJohn778. See you out there.

Notes

*What are some of my favorite workouts? Glad you asked. I can’t resist a good 80s bike ride. Ben Alldis is probably my favorite instructor. When I run I like Becs Gentry - I like having people with English accents tell me what to do. If I go non-British, it’s Olivia Amato. But I also like Sam Yo and Hannah Franksen…so I guess I’m a sucker for that accent.

*There are so many metrics I haven’t explored on the Peloton that I may or may not get into at some point. All I know is I’m doing a better job of working out than I have in years - that’s all the metric I need. BUT if you take a live class the instructors do shout-outs and that spurred me to enter my birthday which is not something I usually like to do on apps like this.

*Oh! I wrote on Wednesday about how Tuesday night I watched the Mets game while I was doing a 60-minute bike ride. I didn’t want that to come off like bragging - the thing I didn’t mention is that after I biked I had a couple of (large) pieces of pie leftover from Easter during the second half of the game. So, you know, the Mets game giveth and the Mets game taketh away.

*That was in the #EveryWeekOnWednesday post on Facebook. You can Like the page here to make sure you don’t miss those. And you can follow me on Twitter here.

*And, if you missed last week’s post, I’m documenting the Mets 2021 season elsewhere on this here site. You can read what I’ve been writing this week there. (Mixed bag for the Mets so far, in case you haven’t been following.)

*If you’re local here’s some restaurant news that might interest you: Kathy and I tried Soul of India (on Route 20 in Sudbury) last week. It was the best Indian food we’ve had in a very long time. We used to love a place that closed a couple of years ago - Rasoi. It’s the closest we’ve had to that - and it was maybe even better. It’s so weird too because we are always in that area, but just never tried Soul of India before. Glad we did. We almost got it again this weekend.