Why SoulCycle Isn’t Worth Your Time or Money
In this episode of “Undercover-Fit Guy,” I dig out my fake nose and moustache to check out the spin class known as SoulCycle. My goal this time is to find out what SoulCycle is, how it works, and what aspect of it I should review.
Before I dive in, let’s start with this. In the same way that I have pointed out in my previous articles about BODYPUMP, OrangeTheory Fitness, CrossFit, and Pure Barre, if you are trying to meet all of your body’s movement needs with one brand alone, you will run into the same basic problem. One exercise class cannot meet all of our human biological needs for movement.
Our biology is meant to move on every level, plane, and direction, with and without a load, and over across varying terrain and multiple textures. Although every single one of these brands claims to be a “full body workout” it is simply not true. Every one of them fails. And it is not their fault. This is a losing battle.
So, is the answer to spend a fortune attending each and every gym on a rotating schedule? Or is the answer to adopt a lifestyle that incorporates enough incidental movement on a day-to-day basis that these workouts become the chocolate coating on the protein bar, not the protein bar itself? I think you know where I am going with this.
Ok, with that said, let’s get into my experience with SoulCycle.
My First SoulCycle Class
I try not to be a person who yucks someone else’s yum, especially when it comes to workouts. Partly because I don’t want to be a jerk (who does) but mostly because I believe anything that gets an otherwise sedentary body up and moving can’t be an entirely bad thing. But I am also an avid cyclist for recreation and for locomotion purposes so the idea of cycling indoors better involve a velodrome or at least a virtual world where I can race against friends and pros.
For those reasons I have thus far in my 40-some years on this planet avoided spin classes. But last night, that all changed at my local SoulCycle location.
SoulCycle is a “45-minute indoor cycling class that features high-intensity cardio, muscle-sculpting strength training, and rhythm-based choreography.” Their website goes on and on from there but I know better than to base my judgement on the marketing jargon of a website, so let’s skip the rest.
It was easy to sign-up for a class online and I luckily have a location within walking (or cycling) distance of my home—score. I signed up on a Sunday and was ready to rock on a Monday. I packed some shorts, socks, a singlette, and a towel in my backpack and arrived the mandatory 15 minutes before class so I could sign the waivers, find a locker, rent some shoes (they have proprietary clips on their shoes), and get changed.
I was ushered into a dark room, with pumping music, and pretty much left to my own devices. I knew that I had been assigned to Bike #30 and I have to admit that it took me a minute or two to figure out where the numbers were on the bikes. I would have asked someone but the music was too loud to bother. So yeah, not off to a great start. But I was determined to keep an open mind. So, I suppressed a middle-aged harumph and started class.
Fast-forward to after class.
As I walked home, I mulled over, again and again, exactly which aspects of the class I would focus on in this article. After sleeping on it, this is what I came up with.
1. How Effective Is SoulCycle at Being a Full-Body Workout?
Let me set the stage. Your feet are literally (not figuratively or metaphorically) clipped into the pedals, your bum is on (or right above) a seat, and your hands are in one of three slightly different positions on the handlebars. Need I say more? This is the equivalent of trying to get a full body workout while wearing a straight jacket.
This is not a problem if SoulCycle were aiming to give you a “cycling workout” but trying to claim that this is “full body” is a problem. So it is the promise more than the delivery that I take issue with. Sure, we stopped pedalling for a few minutes and lifted some (comically tiny) weights but the fact remains that we were in a seated position, feet attached to the pedals, while we bicep curled and overhead pressed away with the three or eight pounds dumbbells.
2. How Much Does SoulCycle Cost?
I paid $31.50, not including a $2 shoe rental fee which they generously waved for me since it was my first class. All that is instead of just heading outside to ride my bike to the grocery store, to the office, or around a park.
I may be biased here since I have always been an avid cyclist but think of it this way: The bicycle itself was invented for one reason only—locomotion. It was not invented to be a piece of exercise equipment. If it were, the designers would have been fired. Just because you can get your heart rate up by riding a bike doesn’t mean that it is the ultimate in fitness gear. That is simply not the purpose of this tool.
3. How Hot and Sweaty Is SoulCycle?
I am making a leap here but I am guessing that this was intentional and meant to give us the impression of a very hard workout.
People who follow this blog may already know that I am what you would call a heavy sweater, but when you put anyone in a small, poorly ventilated room, with a bunch of people riding bikes headed to nowhere, everyone is going to sweat heavily. Regardless of how much (or little) you twist the tension or resistance knob on the bike.
The SoulCycle website claims their workout will give you “high-intensity cardio, muscle-sculpting strength training, and rhythm-based choreography.” I have already mentioned the (embarrassingly) tiny weights and I will get into the choreography later but for now, let’s talk about cardio.
A cardiovascular workout may sound fancy and impressive but cardiovascular exercise is simply “a movement or series of movements that raise your heart rate.” That is it. So yes, you can get a cardio workout by running up stairs, chasing your child or pet, shovelling the snow off your driveway, or dancing around your living room.
In a SoulCycle class, the factor that determines whether you are getting a high, medium, or low-intensity cardio workout is how far and how often you turn the tension knob up or down on your bike. But given the temperature in the room and lack of air flow we all ended the class with the look of someone who had the tension set to kill.
In fact, someone at the back of the room dropped their weights at one point during the cool-down portion of the workout and I was immediately ready to administer CPR to the poor collapsed soul (ha) on Bike #14.
4. How Are SoulCycle Classes Taught?
The website says SoulCycle has “magnetic instructors, who support us, coach us and push us to reach our personal bests.” I could comment on this but honestly, over the pumping music I could only make out about a quarter of what our instructor shouted at us—and most of what I did hear seemed nonsensical and perhaps best summed up on an inspirational Pinterest page.
It was also so loud and dark in the room (at one point the only light in the room was provided by the exit signs) that there was no way I could even ask for help or instruction. The SoulCycle website boasts the “class feels a lot like a dance party: It’s dark, loud, sweaty and fun!” But due to this dance atmosphere, instead of partying, my eyes were glued to the instructor, watching intensely while attempting to mimic her choreography. At the points in the class when the leader left the bike platform to adjust the lights and music, I was completely SOL.
SoulCycle apparently does not hold “instruction” or knowing “what you are doing and why” in high regard. In my class (which had four beginners, like myself) it was clear that if you can’t keep up, or indeed figure out how to execute the move safely, you are on your own.
5. How Well Do SoulCycle Bikes Fit?
As a cyclist, I have spent a lot of time (and money) ensuring that my bike is set up in the correct geometry for my body. I mean let’s face it, cycling is one of the least natural things we can do with our bodies. There is not a single part of our biology that says “sit on this seat, bend forward at the waist, crane your neck up, hold on to this stick, and move your legs in a circle to propel yourself forward at a high velocity!” So, it behooves us cyclists to make sure we do the least amount of biomechanical damage as possible when we do engage in this bizarre ritual.
SoulCycle’s bikes were apparently designed by Villency Design Group (who also designed the Peloton brand bike). Word has it that they “reinvent the stationary wheel” by fussing with three elements:
-
A greater distance between the handlebar and the seat.
Apparently to allow the rider to work their upper body and core while they pedal. Remember when I said that I had spent time and money making sure that my bike fit my body properly? Well, SoulCycle just tossed that out the window so you could do some (fake) “push-ups” and (weird) “crunches” while you spin. -
Hand-sanded joints with an “extra tight seal” to help prevent corrosion caused by sweat.
I for one am pleased with this innovation because I certainly did my best to corrode Bike #30 in SoulCycle’s Yaletown location. -
Robustness to withstand a ton of rider movement.
SoulCycle’s “signature choreography” puts a lot of strain on the bike frame and despite the fact that their bikes are 10-30 percent heavier than a standard spin bike, I still nearly tipped mine over several times so this is another tweak that I am happy they included.
And this brings me to what I decided I really wanted to address in this article. Seeing as I am a cyclist, why would I get on a bike if it wasn’t going to improve my skills?
So, I bring you:
6. Will SoulCycle Make You a Better Cyclist?
Here is a quote from the legendary coach Troy Jacobson (a leader in multisport endurance coaching since 1992): “Every time you go out for a ride, think of good form. Focus on a fluid pedalling action with a relaxed upper body and a flat back. Allow for your knees to track naturally over the pedal spindle and not to splay out.”
Well, you can forget that when you attend a SoulCycle class. Bouncing, twisting, and bending are mandatory. Keeping a “still upper body” as you are usually encouraged to aim for when cycling is simply not allowed in SoulCycle when you are doing their version of crunches (which are really just small shoulder twists, let’s be honest here). And then there are what SoulCycle calls “tap backs.”
Tap Backs
Tap backs are kind of like a bum dip where you (rather ballistically) tap your butt back onto the seat by doing an awkward pelvic thrust and then quickly launching yourself back into a standing position. Not only is this not a helpful maneuver for your cycling fitness but it is also a risky move, biomechanically speaking. The sudden deceleration that is required by your poor back muscles is something I am sure has left more than a few souls (heh) lamenting after their SoulCycle classes.
If you have ever borrowed a friend’s bike and didn’t know it was a fixie (a fixed gear bike), you will know this feeling all too well. The first time you attempt to stop pedalling and just coast for a bit as you can on a bike with gears, you are immediately launched headlong over the handlebars by the relentlessly spinning pedals. It’s not fun, it’s potentially painful and no one at SoulCycle explained to us at all how on earth we were supposed to do this safely.
As Jennifer Sage (the founder of the Indoor Cycling Association) stated in her article about SoulCycle: “There is zero benefit to doing tap backs. They are potentially harmful to joints and the musculature of the back…They aren’t much fun to the female anatomy either.”
Push-ups
While we are at it, let’s talk about the “Push-ups” that we did while (get this) sitting upright on a bike.
Because you are a good Get-Fit Guy follower, you know that to make a muscle stronger, you must have some amount of force for that muscle to work against. When you are doing a push-up, the force you are working against is your body weight and gravity. Well, this simply doesn’t work when you are sitting or even standing on a bike. This move does, however, compromise the amount of power (or watts, as we cyclists call it) that you can create with the bike.
Power
Power output (or the amount of watts you generate) is a measure of how hard you are working, which in the end determines how good of a workout you are getting. If you are there to “burn calories” then I will put it this way: if your power drops, your caloric expenditure also drops.
Quickly and oversimplified-ly, the equation for power is P = fv or “power is equal to force times velocity.” When you are riding a bike, velocity is your cadence (how fast you are pedalling) and force is the resistance you are pushing against (how much resistance you have applied by turning the knob on your SoulCycle bike). So, when those really fast songs come on, it does not matter how well your sweaty legs are keeping up with the beat. If the resistance isn’t high, then the power will be low.
Is SoulCycle Good or Bad?
Ok, I know that I am not painting a very pretty picture here and again, I don’t intend to yuck anyone’s yum. But unlike the majority of Undercover-Fit Guy articles that I have written, I would not recommend SoulCycle. Not even as a component of your fitness regimen. And I would double that for any serious cyclists out there.
It isn’t difficult or complicated to raise your heart rate and to occasionally lift something heavy to challenge your muscles, so why would we pay such a large amount of money to do it in a hot, loud room, without even having the benefit of an instructor who can hear you, help you, and at very least keep you safe?
Was my class fun? Sure. Did I get sweaty? You bet! Am I sore today? Yes, but not in the ways I had hoped (lower back, I am looking at you). Despite how friendly the staff was and how nice the facility was, I will not be back. And not only because of my crazy belief that a bike is not a piece of exercise equipment but instead a means of getting me places.
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About the Author
Brock Armstrong was the host of the Get-Fit Guy podcast between 2017 and 2021. He is a certified AFLCA Group Fitness Leader with a designation in Portable Equipment, NCCP and CAC Triathlon Coach, and a TnT certified run coach. He is also on the board of advisors for the Primal Health Coach Institute and a guest faculty member of the Human Potential Institute.
