This past Tuesday, I was invited to accompany my sister to an indoor cycling class. She received a 21 day trial to a gym and anyone she took got a seven day free trial pass. Going in, I knew indoor cycling classes were intense. Dressed in our yoga leggings, water bottles in hand, we walked into the spin zone with a hopeful attitude. After adjusting our equipment like we read about online, we perched on the seats and immediately realized this was going to hurt.
As it so happens, both of us are lacking an abundance of booty and our tailbones were reminding us of that. Those seats were not comfortable. Yet, we are still hopeful and somewhat positive that we could make it through. After all, the standing and peddling intervals should be better right? Wrong. When we reached an interval that we had to stand up and pedal, we both realized we were too short. My sister is only 5'3" and I measure up to a whopping 4'11". As we were standing and peddling, our tailbones would bump the seat adding to our pain. From then on, our bottoms remained on the seats. About 20 minutes into the class, our bottoms were hurting so bad that we had to leave. Our legs felt like Jell-O as we waddled out of the spin zone.
Despite our efforts, exercise classes are not for us. That's not to say that the class wasn't wonderful. The class is great! The instructor was excellent. The environment was very comfortable. I didn't feel like everyone was watching and judging me. Everyone was focused on themselves and the bike. The instructor pushed us but remind us not to overdo it. The problem was that we thought we were in better shape than we actually are and we tried to do too much too quickly. We didn't build up to it. The fact that we're pretty short probably didn't help either.
If you're interested in trying indoor cycling class, then I highly recommend it. I plan on trying it again. I’ll just have to take my time to work up to it and remember to bring a cushioned bike seat cover. Maybe they'll have a child-size bike by then.