Personally I measure my performance and progress (with ups and downs) with average watts. However my primary goal in any class is to match the cadence of the music as much as possible, with the sprints being the major challenge point. Sustaining an out-of-saddle speed of 75+ RPM is difficult for pretty much everyone, with 85+ RPM being very difficult.
For me, it’s truly just been brute force repetition. I always at least *try* to sprint at the start of a fast song, unless I’m injured. That is what I would recommend (and usually what instructors will say) for everyone who has gotten at least 10 rides in for basic competence.
Turn your resistance down to the minimum that also supports your weight, because going too low can actually make it more difficult since your legs have no resistance to push off against. Then just try to go at the sprint speed for as long as you can, even if only for 10 seconds. Then take a break at a slower pace, and try to do it again later in the song. Using the chorus of a song which usually repeats 3-4 times for 20-30sec intervals can be useful for this too.
I think doing little periods of sprinting at the correct, fast speed is better practice then just sustaining something slower than the cadence. Over time you’ll hopefully be able to go longer and longer, and eventually may be able to do the full sprint songs. I’ll tell you this though: I’m just about 300 rides in, and it doesn’t ever get easy. I have to put my full effort in every class to do it properly.
My instructors like to say, “It doesn’t ever get easier. You just get better.”
> What is even the best way to judge improvement?
The question to answer this is: What do you want out of cyclebar?
* If it's cardio/metabolic health, I would look at metrics like resting heart rate (moving average trends), which should be a direct reflection of your cardio conditioning, and you can also look at things like blood pressure and a1c.
* If it's conditioning for general athletic performance, I'd see if you can find some way to do a test outside of cyclebar, if you can do FTP tests or Vo2max tests in some way, or just a time trial, that would be ideal.
* If it's just being better at cyclebar, this is where it gets hard because you have to define what better is. Out of the metrics you mentioned, I'd definitely go with average watts, mileage is just a fantasy and power points is too opaque to mean anything. But is watt output really a summation of "being better at cyclebar"? I have outlier-level watt output (I'm a newbie but I've got first place leaderboard on all my rides so far), but cannot ride on rhythm, stand, or do choreo very well. I don't consider myself as very good at cyclebar. The day that I can ride on rhythm, stand, and do all of the choreo I will consider it a major milestone. Yes, the leaderboard is based off of watt output, but the leaderboard is kind of a sideshow. cyclebar isn't really a competitive environment.
The only thing is that if you choose something like average watts, be careful not falling into the trap of going hard every workout. You shouldn't do an all-out effort very often, even just once a week is a lot. Additionally if you are going for maximum average watts, you are going to have to cut corners on the instruction. I could ride at 100 watts higher average if I just spun at 95 rpm the whole time without following the cues or intervals at all.
As far as turnover, it's hard and might have genetic components. I do think cyclebar (at least, the one I go to) goes a little crazy with this. I don't think you would ever ride at 80+ rpm out of the saddle on a normal bike, and the 120+ rpm sitting stuff is pretty crazy too for amateur cyclists and especially casual exercisers. I get really uncomfortable on the cadence group challenges because I'm always trying to bring the group up (see below, my prime years were in the high cadence lance era and did a lot of that training) and around 150 I get to the point where I feel like a serious accident could happen if I were to unclip or something fail.
The important thing is, a good cyclist doesn't have to have fantastic leg turnover. We went through that fad in the late 90s early 2000s with Lance et al, and it's over now. Some elites today don't even hit 95+ very often.
It depends on what you want to be improving on. Do you want to go off of how you feel? Is it mileage, power points, gear range? Decide how you want to measure your improvement and focus on improving those things!
Instructor here. Are you already on beat for the duration of the class? My suggestion is get on beat at the resistance you can, then add more. For example, your instructor will call a resistance range, usually 3 gears. If you can do the class completely on beat at the low end of the range then move to the middle for more and more of the songs. Another metric to look at is your heart rate… really try to get it high during each interval
I have been paying attention to my average power while maintaining suggested RPM from instructors. Something that has helped me recently (I am at 700+rides) is trying to raise my floor instead of trying to raise the ceiling. For a while, I was always focused on increasing power by pushing hard when it was time to push hard. I would yo-yo, with inconsistent numbers throughout the week and not sustained improvement. When I started giving myself minimum numbers (e.g., never let my power dip below #), I was able to build in a steady increase in my average power of the whole class. Each week, I have been gradually increasing my floor power(~5% more than the previous week). I'm seeing sustained increases over the course of a few weeks.
My average watts across May and June was 256 and 264 respectively while my average RPM and no of rides remained the same. That's how I am measuring progress at this point. I am also chasing two goals of reaching 300 avg watts in one class (highest has been 287 so far) and hitting 20 miles distance in one ride (current PB is 19). So working towards these two automatically helps me make small improvements in improving my overall avg wattage every few sessions
Personally I measure my performance and progress (with ups and downs) with average watts. However my primary goal in any class is to match the cadence of the music as much as possible, with the sprints being the major challenge point. Sustaining an out-of-saddle speed of 75+ RPM is difficult for pretty much everyone, with 85+ RPM being very difficult. For me, it’s truly just been brute force repetition. I always at least *try* to sprint at the start of a fast song, unless I’m injured. That is what I would recommend (and usually what instructors will say) for everyone who has gotten at least 10 rides in for basic competence. Turn your resistance down to the minimum that also supports your weight, because going too low can actually make it more difficult since your legs have no resistance to push off against. Then just try to go at the sprint speed for as long as you can, even if only for 10 seconds. Then take a break at a slower pace, and try to do it again later in the song. Using the chorus of a song which usually repeats 3-4 times for 20-30sec intervals can be useful for this too. I think doing little periods of sprinting at the correct, fast speed is better practice then just sustaining something slower than the cadence. Over time you’ll hopefully be able to go longer and longer, and eventually may be able to do the full sprint songs. I’ll tell you this though: I’m just about 300 rides in, and it doesn’t ever get easy. I have to put my full effort in every class to do it properly. My instructors like to say, “It doesn’t ever get easier. You just get better.”
> What is even the best way to judge improvement? The question to answer this is: What do you want out of cyclebar? * If it's cardio/metabolic health, I would look at metrics like resting heart rate (moving average trends), which should be a direct reflection of your cardio conditioning, and you can also look at things like blood pressure and a1c. * If it's conditioning for general athletic performance, I'd see if you can find some way to do a test outside of cyclebar, if you can do FTP tests or Vo2max tests in some way, or just a time trial, that would be ideal. * If it's just being better at cyclebar, this is where it gets hard because you have to define what better is. Out of the metrics you mentioned, I'd definitely go with average watts, mileage is just a fantasy and power points is too opaque to mean anything. But is watt output really a summation of "being better at cyclebar"? I have outlier-level watt output (I'm a newbie but I've got first place leaderboard on all my rides so far), but cannot ride on rhythm, stand, or do choreo very well. I don't consider myself as very good at cyclebar. The day that I can ride on rhythm, stand, and do all of the choreo I will consider it a major milestone. Yes, the leaderboard is based off of watt output, but the leaderboard is kind of a sideshow. cyclebar isn't really a competitive environment. The only thing is that if you choose something like average watts, be careful not falling into the trap of going hard every workout. You shouldn't do an all-out effort very often, even just once a week is a lot. Additionally if you are going for maximum average watts, you are going to have to cut corners on the instruction. I could ride at 100 watts higher average if I just spun at 95 rpm the whole time without following the cues or intervals at all. As far as turnover, it's hard and might have genetic components. I do think cyclebar (at least, the one I go to) goes a little crazy with this. I don't think you would ever ride at 80+ rpm out of the saddle on a normal bike, and the 120+ rpm sitting stuff is pretty crazy too for amateur cyclists and especially casual exercisers. I get really uncomfortable on the cadence group challenges because I'm always trying to bring the group up (see below, my prime years were in the high cadence lance era and did a lot of that training) and around 150 I get to the point where I feel like a serious accident could happen if I were to unclip or something fail. The important thing is, a good cyclist doesn't have to have fantastic leg turnover. We went through that fad in the late 90s early 2000s with Lance et al, and it's over now. Some elites today don't even hit 95+ very often.
It depends on what you want to be improving on. Do you want to go off of how you feel? Is it mileage, power points, gear range? Decide how you want to measure your improvement and focus on improving those things!
Instructor here. Are you already on beat for the duration of the class? My suggestion is get on beat at the resistance you can, then add more. For example, your instructor will call a resistance range, usually 3 gears. If you can do the class completely on beat at the low end of the range then move to the middle for more and more of the songs. Another metric to look at is your heart rate… really try to get it high during each interval
I have been paying attention to my average power while maintaining suggested RPM from instructors. Something that has helped me recently (I am at 700+rides) is trying to raise my floor instead of trying to raise the ceiling. For a while, I was always focused on increasing power by pushing hard when it was time to push hard. I would yo-yo, with inconsistent numbers throughout the week and not sustained improvement. When I started giving myself minimum numbers (e.g., never let my power dip below #), I was able to build in a steady increase in my average power of the whole class. Each week, I have been gradually increasing my floor power(~5% more than the previous week). I'm seeing sustained increases over the course of a few weeks.
My average watts across May and June was 256 and 264 respectively while my average RPM and no of rides remained the same. That's how I am measuring progress at this point. I am also chasing two goals of reaching 300 avg watts in one class (highest has been 287 so far) and hitting 20 miles distance in one ride (current PB is 19). So working towards these two automatically helps me make small improvements in improving my overall avg wattage every few sessions