For the next eight weeks, Doug Rusho, Personal Trainer and recently named winner of the “America’s Top Male Indoor Cycle Instructor” award, will be writing a weekly blog post about his Psyclewerks program, which is now in its second week. Want to read the ride report from his classes or learn more about this popular program so you can take it next time it’s offered? Read on!

Take it away, Doug.

Over the next two months, I will be guest posting on this exciting new program created for indoor group cycling.  Traditional indoor cycling classes often referred to as Spinning rely on how exercise feels by using a variety of perceived exertion, resistance, and cadence scales.  They also tend to lean towards high-energy music and entertainment.

Psyclewerks 2.0 utilizes the latest technology of power measurement to greatly enhance fitness gains.  Quite simply, power is exactly how hard one is working for every single second.  On the bike, power is derived from how hard you push the pedals (resistance) and how fast (cadence).  Although knowing how your body feels still plays an important role, knowing exactly what your body is doing is instrumental to the maximum execution of each workout. 

With an initial power profile test, we can also cater every ride to each individual’s fitness level.  This means that every person in a Psyclewerks class is getting a near perfect workout for his/her body.  Adding to this, we can still keep the “effort matched” music play lists, the entertainment, and the camaraderie of being a team of athletes, all training to improve.

The goals of this series of blog posts are three-fold. 

1. Each week there will be a “ride report.”  This will be an overview of the most recently completed class.  Outdoor cyclists love to relive their rides, through post-ride lattes, and emails.  It is a fun and social aspect of the sport. 
2. I will provide some basic education on power training, exercise physiology, and biomechanics.  After all “knowledge is POWER” (get it?). 

3. Finally, on occasion, there will be a fun story from the wacky world of cycling and or/ from your Psyclewerks Coach.  

Enjoy the ride!

“Test Day”  Week #1

I wasn’t quite sure to what to expect. This class is the first of a brand new program. Our first class was all about gathering personal information and “playing with power.” This would not be like the rest of the classes and I had a small fear of it being boring. I did pose a challenge to myself and to our “team” of athletes. I am looking for a 100% success rate. Everyone improves by the end of this program.

After a thorough explanation and a warm-up, it was time to test. I cued up 40 seconds of “Pirates Pete Remix” and when the bass kicked in it was go time. 20 straight minutes riding as hard as possible. Athletes were told to maintain as high of a power output as possible. The energy was peaked and a little frantic at first, but when “Break on Through” by the Doors came on everyone had settled into a groove.

Athletes began to adjust their resistance and cadence to find their optimal sweet spot for producing power. Through the halfway point, Moby’s “Go” kept everyone on track, although signs of fatigue were beginning to show as breathing rates started increasing. Athletes were coached for pace and patience, but when “Uprising” by Muse plowed into the speakers everyone seemed up for the challenge of going harder.

With 5 minutes left, someone said, “The next song better be good!” Everyone was at his/her breaking point.

I purposely drew back some energy with “Tikal” by E.S. Posthumous. It has a solid driving beat but a calming sense to it. Everyone was going to need that little extra energy to finish strong. “Tikal”  crescendos at the end to bridge into the finale, “The Sound” by Switchfoot. After a brief guttural bass guitar and drum riff, the first word of the song is a resounding “BOOM.”  This song just bleeds energy and power.  You could see and feel everyone just ground themselves into their machine for the final dig to the finish. Everyone livened up and drove it home to the 20 minute mark.

The Functional Threshold Power test was over and the averages were recorded. From the back of the room, someone said, ”That was the hardest I have ever worked for 20 minutes!”

Goal accomplished.

After 10 minutes of recovery and some instructions on power zones, I introduced some drill work to get our athletes used to reading and adjusting power effort. There was a huge “light bulb” moment when everyone discovered what happens to your power when you stand and pedal without making a certain adjustment.

The class winded down, but to my surprise the energy remained high. I have never seen so many people so excited about the next 7 classes and this program.

They were “jacked” on power training!

Despite having presented to over 100 students at the Indoor Cycle Instructor Pro conference in Boston the night before, this first Psyclewerks class was the high point of my weekend. I spent most of Monday calculating and creating  power zone cards and their weekly homework training session. Sure enough, Monday night, as I was posting the homework and power zone cards in the files, one of my athletes was asking where it was.

It is going to be a great eight weeks!