140: Howard Stern’s Jenn Sherman Obsession Continues And Our Interview With John Prewitt
Tickets for Homecoming go on sale February 21 and Crystal has tips on how to get your tickets.
Peloton was all over the pop culture universe this week – Howard Stern, Curb Your Enthusiasm, The Steve Harvey Show, and This Is Us.
The new Power Zone instructors are officially announced.
A rare tweet from John Foley as he takes pride in Peloton being named a LBGTQ inclusive workplace by Human Rights Campaign.
Gearpatrol.com has an article comparing Peloton with Wahoo.
Dailymaverick.co.za compares all sorts of connected fitness products.
Robin Arzon makes the Create Cultivate 100 list.
A new Artist Series is announced featuring Billie Eilish.
Jersey Shore’s Snookie talks about peeing on the bike.
More evening classes are on the way.
HMC was in London.
Kristin McGee launches a yoga series of prenatal classes.
All this plus our interview with John Prewitt!
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Listen to the podcast here:
Howard Stern’s Jenn Sherman Obsession Continues And Our Interview With John Prewitt
What do you have in store for people?
We’ve got a plethora of things, little bits and pieces of Pelotonia.
No sneak peek?
Yeah, I get tired of doing the sneak peeks. Basically. I repeat what we’re going to do.
It’s like a table of contents. Since you’re not going to do it, then I’ll do my shameless plugs. Don’t forget we’re available on Apple podcasts. You can go there and a rate and review and most importantly, subscribe. That is so you never miss an episode. You can do that wherever you choose to get your podcast. There should be some subscribe option and you should take advantage of it. You can also find us on Facebook at Facebook.com/theclipout. While you’re there, like the page, join the group. We have so many people joining.
I don’t know what you did. Somebody must have posted something about us somewhere.
It has been quite the influx. Hello and welcome. Also you can leave a review there and eventually, I’ll get around reading them. Here’s one from the good old iTunes. This is from ArnoldFamily1. They said, “I love all things Peloton but hadn’t leaned into The Clip Out podcast even though Britt Drake, #SweatingGlitter, told me it was fantastic, informative, fun and worth a listen. Thanks for all of your work and keep it up.” #AssLikeA10YOBoy is the leaderboard name. There you go.
Thank you for that very nice review. Thank you, Britt, for telling them we’re fantastic.
You’re not going to say thank you by name to the person that left the review?
No.
Not even just once?
No. I don’t know their actual name.
You could use the leaderboard name. Also. don’t forget if you want to say up to date with everything that goes on with the show, you can sign up for our newsletter theclipout.com. It will come to you weekly-ish.
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Homecoming will be here before you know it.
It is a few months away.
Tickets will be going on sale very soon.
February 12th at noon, Eastern. For those of you who are new to this, I am going to tell you to expect everything bad to happen. Expect that the internet won’t work. Expect that your computer will freeze up inexplicably at 11:59. Expect that Peloton will start ten minutes early. Expect that they will start ten minutes late. I don’t know which of those things will occur, but all of them happened.
Last year while trying to buy tickets, your computer got feline AIDS. You’ll never know what’s going to happen.
I had to take it to the vet. It was crazy. Here’s my suggestion for you. Have your phone browser ready. Have your computer from work, if you work, ready. Have your personal computer ready and have your spouse do the same because you can only buy one ticket at a time.
Do you want to give away all your tips like this?
I love our Clip Out audience because they’re going to ask me anyway. I’m going to get a thousand inbox messages. Keep it on the DL, keep it amongst all several thousands of you. If they’re planning on going, I want them to have the best shot possible. It’s my gift to you. Consider it a late holiday gift.
That’s very gracious of you.
Thank you.
That’s all we know at the moment?
It is. The tickets are $95. There is another thing that we do know actually. It appears that this year, you tell them which classes you would like to take. You’d say, “I like this instructor, I like that instructor, I like this type of workout.” Then they’re going to assign you where they want to assign you. There will be no signing up. They’re going to put you where they want to put you. I think that’s going to be horrible. There are going to be so many complaints. It’s going to be insane and everyone gets to attend the community run. Everybody’s in on that.
That’s probably an easier thing to accommodate tons of people for.
It sold out so fast last year.
The slogan this year is, “You get what you get and you don’t throw a fit.”
It should be that slogan every year. They will still throw a fit.
A little window into the mind of Crystal O’Keefe. If you’re wondering, sometimes I tease her about being stubborn and you see the bright, shiny side of her, not the stubbornness or things like the faces she’s making it me, but to show you how stubborn she is. I wish you guys could see her face. She’s giggling with her mouth closed. She’s laughing, but also has a sour face going. You only get that one about 2% of the time, so you’re very fortunate. Anyway, in the notes that I have here, it doesn’t say homecoming, it says HRI. For the newer listeners, we’re not going to explain it. You can ask a Peloton friend homecoming versus HRI.
I want to mention one other thing that was not on the list. I saw posted in The Clip Out group that Kristina Blair Howard mentioned that Peloton’s Q2 earnings are coming up on February 5th at 5:00 PM Eastern. That’s the Q2 earnings call for Peloton. I will be on that. If anybody would like to join and you have shares, you should listen along. The link is out there at Facebook.com/theclipout.
Back to our regularly scheduled program. Howard Stern continued his obsession with Jenn Sherman.
Working from home, it's nice to have the option of getting a workout without having to go to the gym. Share on XI had a rough day when we were putting the news together, so I did not include it. He actually had a visit from Jenn via the call-in feature.
She had to be beside herself.
She got through.
Do you think she actually gave another number? When we were in the radio, we had the request line, but then you had what we called the hotline, which is if something had really gone bad. Then you had what we called the warm line. That was what you’d give to guests to call.
I don’t think so because this sounded like an unscheduled call. He was talking about how she sings on the bike all the time and that she had done a new track ride that week and that she didn’t sing as much. She was calling in to tell him, “That was me covering that ride. I didn’t know all those songs because I’m not the one that put it together.” You could tell how nervous she was. Her voice sounded so nervous. She kept it together. He would have never known how nervous she was but I know because I listen to her voice all the time.
He knew. He’s a very astute interviewer.
He was very gentle with her.
There’s a lot of bluster there but he’s good at picking up on cues and knowing what people’s buttons are. My guess is he knew it.
I have to mention that our interviewee, John Prewitt, also known as Kenny_Bania. He is the one who founded that clip for me and allowed me to post it on his behalf in The Clip Out. He said there’s another one because Howard Stern’s not done talking about her. I didn’t understand.
It sounds like he was talking about doing some hypothetical live event. He was trying to get people there for free and they were riffing. They started talking about having Jenn Sherman on a bike and having the entire audience on Peloton. They were being goofy.
Going back to the previous clip, after he hung up with Jenn, he started telling Robin, his cohost, about how Jenn Sherman is to him.
He should have told Jenn Sherman. It’s not like she’s not listening. She’s still hearing it. Does he know how radio works? I would think he does by now.
Maybe he was a little nervous too. When you’re starstruck, you’re starstruck.
Even people that meet famous people all the time, they still have those certain people that can rattle them. It happens.
I’ve seen it happen to you very rarely.
I don’t know what you’re talking about. It was all monkeys-related. Other than that, I’m just like, “What’s up, Bruce Willis?” He was like, “You produced Headquarters?” Then I get all nervous. While we’re talking about Peloton in the pop culture, it had quite a week with Stern and then there was an out-joke on Curb Your Enthusiasm.
I thought it was in the middle of the episode?
No, that was the final shot of him on the Peloton.
Maybe it was toward the end. He was riding a Peloton because he had been working out at the gym. Then at the end, he was riding a Peloton in tennis shoes because it’s Larry David.
It was weird though. You pointed it out, but I thought it was worth mentioning. It opens with him on a treadmill in a gym and then obviously there’s a kerfuffle and then later, he doesn’t want to go to the gym. He’s going to work-out at home and then you see his work-out room with a Peloton and a weight machine and a treadmill? I was like, “Why would you ever go to the gym?”
I don’t think they thought that through. Clearly, they’re not as obsessed with workout rooms as we are, because I am.
Also, Peloton got mention on This Is Us.
I don’t want to know any spoilers, but it’s something about Randall mentioned.
That’s St. Louis’ Sterling K. Brown.
For some reason, I wanted to call him RK Sterling and I was like, “No, that’s like JK Rowling.” I don’t know what happened. There were too many Ks in my head. The joys of getting old. I love him. He’s such a great actor. I like that show.
I think there’s only so long you can keep that storytelling. I said it when that show started, “This is going to be Lost for soccer moms.” It starts off great, but how do you keep telling a story like this when you want to tell it indefinitely? It’s still enjoyable.
That first season was magnetic.
That was like first season of Desperate Housewives. There are some shows when that first season is perfect. This Is Us, Desperate Housewives, Friday Night Lights, those are prime examples. Anyway, off of TV talk.
We’re not done with pop culture.
We’re not because Robin Arzon was on the Steve Harvey show.
She even got Steve Harvey to ride on a Peloton on his show. It didn’t look like it was for very long and he was still wearing his suit. They had a great talk and it’s been posted all over the place, so you can check that out. It was great to see Robin on Steve Harvey show. That’s awesome.
Christine and Olivia officially added to the Powerzone line.
The mystery is done. Out of the huge debates, the counting of the ballots, Christine was at the top every time. Olivia was all over the place, sometimes up, sometimes not. They’re both there. The Peloton Prophet was correct and it was announced during the joint Peloton Powerzone ride.
When you're new to riding, it can be very intimidating to ride live. Share on XAnother one. John Foley had an interesting tweet. He doesn’t tweet a whole lot.
I hope he doesn’t think I stalk him because I watch him on all social media channels.
There are lots of people who watch him on all social media channels.
He tweeted that Peloton have earned 100% on human rights campaigns, Corporate Equality Index for LGBTQ inclusive workplace policies and practice. He was very proud of that and that’s awesome. He should be proud of that. Everybody at Peloton should be proud of that.
I wonder what they score that on. I’ll have to go read that.
You can go read it. If anybody else is interested as well, you can find it at CEI 2020. If you google that, you’ll find it.
They can use that hashtag, #CEI2020, on Twitter and it will pop right up. There was an interesting article in GearPatrol.com.
They compared a Wahoo bike and a Peloton bike.
What is a Wahoo?
It’s a training bike. The Wahoo bike is an indoor training bike. They have trainers that you can put underneath your bike, like we saw at the bike shop where you use your outdoor bike, you stick it on there. These weren’t rollers, but they have those too. They have different kinds of trainers.
You use your road bike as an indoor training bike?
This is their answer to Peloton Stationary Bike. They came out with a bike that is like ‘s bike, in that it’s an indoor bike. That’s the only thing they have in common, nothing else about it.
I wonder what all those road bike people who’ve been shitting on indoor stationary bikes because of Peloton.
They’re still shitting on it because I’m not done.
They were so above it.
They still are because here’s the thing, the Wahoo is specific to trainers or it’s to people who train outside. The reason that’s important is because if you’re training on it, you can move the handlebars back and forth. It gets you a more aerodynamic fit, just like your actual road bike, which the Peloton can’t do. It’s not meant to do that. There are a lot of differences. The Wahoo is more specific for people who are training for things like triathlons or riding outside in general. Whereas the Peloton is meant to be a stationary spin bike. You can also use it to train for outdoor rides. They’re two totally different tools.
I’m sure the Wahoo thing comes in handy, especially if you’re an outdoor rider that lives in a place where you get snow a lot.
You can use it with different apps. You can use it with Swift, you can use it with all these other different apps to do races or connect with other people online. When you do that, somehow it’s able to increase your incline or decrease your incline on the bike automatically.
It does it for you.
You also have gears that you can shift just like your outdoor bike. Those are all things that are very specific to training. This article was attempting to say, “Which should you do?” A lot of people had issues with this article. I posted it. I thought they did a good job of saying, “Peloton is for one thing and this is for another.” It was to compare them point by point.
I don’t even know how you compare it because it sounds like it’s pretty spiffy.
That’s why people had a problem with the article because they’re not equal tools. They’re not meant for the same purpose. There’s some crossover. If you had a Venn diagram, they could both be in the middle but one’s for training and one’s for spin class. I thought the article did a pretty good job of explaining that. They were very positive to Peloton and to Wahoo, which I was appreciative of because sometimes people are in one camp or the other. That’s why the article is valuable to me. It’s a great breakdown point by point of each bike for both of those different things. For somebody who is in the market for both, you’re in that Venn diagram center piece, this is a great article.
I’m sure if you ride outside and you enjoy that, but then you also see the benefits of Peloton. I’m sure you probably are torn, but there are probably tons and tons. I’m sure they’re out there.
DailyMaverick.co.za had an article and they’re talking about how the home gym has returned with a vengeance, which we’ve talked about many times. They break down all of the different connected fitness stuff that matters. I say, “That matters,” because not everyone made it. They talked about the Peloton Bike, the Peloton Tread, they talked about the Hydrow, they talked about Mirror, they talked about tonal. That’s a lot. Another thing I found interesting that somebody called out the second I posted it was they had the prices wrong for the Peloton stuff. What they did is they included the monthly fee as the monthly fee of the subscription and if you were buying it with financing it. They bundled it together. It looked like they would show, “Here’s your price per month and here’s your price for the bike.” It looked like it was a $2,000 bike, plus you’ve got to pay $80 a month. I was like, “That’s not right at all.” They did that on the Tread and the Bike, but they did not do it on any other piece of equipment. That was kind interesting. I think it might’ve been the person taking the information from Peloton didn’t get it right.
They didn’t process it properly.
It was a good article for what it was worth. It was a good break down of everything. They want to get clicks. It wasn’t anything too exciting.
Also, .za is South Africa, which then also makes you wonder who they’re writing this for because you can’t get a Peloton in South Africa. It was a British colony as we know, but I’m curious as to who’s the intended reader if you’re writing about it in a country where you can’t get it? Maybe it’s coming to they know something and we don’t. If they knew that much more, they will get the price right.
Tonal is not available in any country other than America. I don’t think that’s about what country of origin. For some reasons, this was about clicks.
There was the Create & Cultivate 100 list.
Robin Arzon posted about this. They went through influencers by section. Under Health and Wellness, she was listed as one of the top contenders of the Create & Cultivate list. It’s pretty cool. Congrats, Robin.
We should’ve talked about this in the pop culture stuff, but Snooki peed on her bike.
Maybe more than once, it’s hard to say. Apparently, you pop out a couple of kids and there can be accidents. Sometimes there’s a little stress incontinence and that happens for her on the Peloton. That has never happened to me on the Peloton. It has happened at other times though. Maybe you sneeze just wrong. Getting old sucks. She’s not that old.
She’s probably 35 or something. A lot of people chimed in. Half of the people were like, “You’re awful. I hate you.” There are a lot of people who chimed in, “That’s a thing.” I know that you refuse to watch Jersey Shore. I get sucked into it. I don’t watch the back to the shore thing they’re doing, but I like it. It’s easy to make fun of the cast of Jersey Shore. They’re very much cartoon characters. I will say, the longer I watch it, the more I was like, “These are pretty nice people. They seem genuinely nice.”
Embrace the community you find from doing Peloton. Share on XWe watched that Marriage Boot Camp. You might remember that some of the characters. It grew on me. I was like, “This guy.” Then he grew on me. He’s adorable.
What I like about most of the casts of Jersey Shore is that they were exactly what they told you they were going to be.
I have respect for that.
They didn’t have any shame in it. They didn’t lie. Even when they were out like carousing and tearing through ladies, they were like, “This is what we do.” They were very upfront about it. It was like, “This shouldn’t shock you.” I grew to have a certain amount of affection for them, much to my surprise.
I shouldn’t judge.
It looks like there’s a new artist series being launched. It will be the first one that the volume level won’t go past six.
That’s not true. It’s going to be Billie Eilish for those of you wondering what that even means. There are a lot of you who don’t know who Billie Eilish is. I didn’t know until about a year ago and I dig it. It’s not something that I would go to all the time, but Jenn Sherman has included her in some of her playlists, and it works. I think that this will be good. I don’t know if I’ll enjoy it as some of the other ones because I don’t know as many of her songs. Some of her songs I enjoy. I have to respect the fact that she’s been writing songs for so long and she’s sixteen.
She’s selling out arenas in a heartbeat. She does have songs that I like, but I just don’t think of her music as hard driving exercise. It falls into that whisper rock camp to me.
There are places of it. It’s very incumbent upon the teacher to do their magic with making it work. I think that these two that they chose, so it’s going to be Kendall on the Bike and then it’s going to be Becs Gentry for the run and Anna Greenberg is going to do the flow. I think that they’re all well-suited to do that. I like what these artists collaborations that they’ve been picking instructors, they’ve been matching them with musicians that they mesh with and they use in their classes. I think that’s great.
This is the first artist series that’s all cooled down.
It’s going to be good.
More evening classes are on the way.
I don’t know how much that’s going to affect a good portion of our audience. I found this on the UK page. There are more evening classes are coming in the UK. That’s six hours later than it is here. I think that will mean more afternoon classes for the US. We’ll see how that goes. They’re going to be coming in from the London studio. Of course, there are going to be more opportunities to ride live. That is very exciting for the London studio. They’ve been wanting to grow. Now, they have four instructors. This is great news for them. This is awesome.
I wonder how long it will be as they add more countries before there’s pretty much live classes almost 24 hours a day.
That will depend on where they’re at because they added London and then Germany and it’s probably going to depend on where they go because if they’re not constantly going one direction, if they’re not going East or West, it’s not going to matter.
I bet you, it happens eventually.
Hannah Marie Corbin was also in London this. That’s another reason that we wanted to mention London. She was there and she got to ride live with Sam Yo. Then afterwards, they had a little meet and greet out in the main area, the main lobby, and then she did some stretches with some of the people that came in. It was a great time from what it looked like.
There’s a new yoga class?
Yes. I should have included that. The last Wednesday of every month at 8:00 AM Eastern, there’s going to be a whole new series, 60 minutes live Prenatal Class with Kristin McGee. That is very exciting. People have been asking for these. This is so exciting. Eventually, all the instructors are going to have their own curated thing like this.
Now they have a Postnatal class, so you will stop peeing on the bike.
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Joining us is John Prewitt. John, how’s it going?
How are you doing?
I always like to find out how people found Peloton originally.
We got our bike in July of 2017. My wife had a couple of friends who had the bike that she knew of and they were your casual riders. They weren’t drinking the Peloton Kool-Aid in all over social media about it and in the community. She was aware of a couple of friends who did it and liked it and had it. Right after that, all the targeted ads start showing up on Facebook. We had taken an interest, but we were both haters on the whole subscription model. We were thinking, “You buy a bike and then you have to pay a gym membership on top of that?” We had no idea of what came with that of all the other content than the extras. We lived in Austin, Texas at the time. What sold it for us as we went to the Austin showroom, which was fairly new and we both did a ride side-by-side in the showroom. We did a 30-minute Cody ride. Right after that, that sold us. We’re all in. We bought the bike and got it a week or so later. My first ride was a Cody 30-minute Guilty Pleasures ride. From there, it took off with our level of engagement.
Before this, were you guys both into fitness, going to the gym or didn’t go at all? How was that working?
We were not gym-goers. We never had a gym membership. My wife was always into barre-based workouts. When we lived in Chicago before we lived in Austin, she started going to The Bar Method, which is a ballet-based studio exercise class. This Bar Method blew up and this was back in 2006 or 2007. She started going there, taking regular classes and then we moved to Austin shortly after that and she got into a similar studio exercise experience called Pure Barre methods competition in the same exercise space realm. She became a teacher there. She was teaching Pure Barre and taking classes there in Austin for the entire time. We lived there for a few years. She always did Pure Barre. I always played sports. Growing up, I always played ice hockey. I played goalie since I was little and traveled in high school and college. After our son was born, I stopped playing in men’s ice hockey leagues in Austin. We had a crappy elliptical in our house, which I would like to plop my iPad on and binge watch Netflix and would casually go back and forth on the elliptical. That was the extent of the exercise. I’m not walking the dog every day. We both worked from home, so it’s nice having that option, not having to go to the gym but not gym-goers at all.
What is the difference between Barre and Pure Barre?
They’re similar like small movements with weights.
There’s no real difference between the two things? It’s just a different brand name. It’s Coke and Pepsi.
They are two different companies. My wife is more partial to Pure Barre. She thinks it’s a harder workout. She’s taught it and she’s more biased towards that, but similar workouts.
I should be careful because this is probably how some people feel when I’m like, “NordicTrack and Peloton.”
I fear for your safety, John, because she keeps it and you’re like, “They’re the same thing.”
I’m sure you have others that are crazy about the barre method. There’s something called Daily Barre. There are many variations with the word barre in it that are barre-based. It’s a little watered down.
You were sports-minded and fit, but Peloton, I would assume, was a game-changer for you, guys?
Definitely, because you didn’t have to spend all that time going somewhere. It was something to look forward to during the day. We both work from home, so it’s like we hop on there, jump right off and go right back into our work routine for the rest of the day.
How many days on end do you spend at your house without leaving?
It’s many. She still goes to Pure Barre. She supplements with Peloton. I’m working out maybe 4 or 5 days a week, but some days I’ll be home all day long and I go out and walk the dog at some point in the afternoon, besides getting the rides in. Before we moved into this house, we were in an apartment for four months while we were waiting for this one to be built. We were right on top of each other, working maybe 5 feet away. That was challenging and stressful. That tested the relationship, but we made it out on top.
Unlike the people that your wife knew that had Peloton, you guys are not casual users. You like social media and Peloton.
When I first started, I wasn’t crazy. I’m insane with it now with how much I ride throughout the day. My wife, she does it almost every day, but I do multiple rides in the morning and the afternoon. When we first got it, I was on the OPP, the Official Peloton Page, here and there like I was a newbie. I’m a lurker posting here and there. It was after I found a few tribes, I joined Denis’s Menaces first and then I found the JSS Tribe and then the #BooCrew. I started posting little snippets of pre-shows and then compilations. I took it to a whole new level.
What inspired you to start posting your videos?
Back when I first started riding and Denis was the one that got me hooked on the bike. Because he was hired basically right before we got the Peloton. I discovered him immediately. I loved his personality. I loved how he told stories through the ride and his corny jokes. I felt like he was always kicking your ass but you didn’t realize it because you were having such a good time. I noticed whenever I would ride live, I’d always join the ride early for the pre-show before they started taping for on-demand. Every now and then, he’d give a shout out and I would start recording with my iPhone. I would set up a little tripod. It was this janky recording or you hear me coughing in the background or blowing my nose from time to time. If you would tell a funny story or something or a shout out, I’d post that on the Menaces page or the OPP.
It evolved from thereafter iPhone had screen recording after they added that feature where you could record directly off the screen a nice clean recording. I started recording the pre-shows and then recording funny moments and randomly posting them here and there. It took off from there. When I started riding with Cody more and his pre-shows were hilarious, the things he would say before the ride would start. I would randomly start posting pre-show moments and then people would say like, “Do you have my shout-out from this pre-show?” I became the unofficial bootlegger of the pre-show, which I love to do because I feel like if you join the ride right when it starts or right before, I almost feel like you’re missing out on a little party because you never see that again. It’s gone forever.
I thought that you have stumbled into a little cottage industry.
Especially with all the rides that got deleted.
You can make a bank if you’ve got that Jenn’s Men Tribe.
I only got the pre-show and a little quip here and there from the actual ride.
As Peloton gets larger and more important, this is probably a portion of their programming that they might not even be keeping themselves.
I don’t know if it’s deleted forever. There was an awesome moment in a Jenn Sherman ride where her daughter showed up to ride with her in the studio for the first time and surprised her. I got most of that moment of the pre-show where she freaked out and realized it was her. Security came like somebody’s going to rush the stage. I sent her that clip, but I don’t know if they ever keep stuff like that because I’ve never seen it posted by them or anywhere else.
It’s a good question. From a data management standpoint, I’m guessing they delete it but from a, “We need to keep a record of all of the awesome things that we do,” who knows what they do?
All I know is my memory on my iPhone is rapidly dwindling. The amount of Cody albums that I have of clips and compilations, I got to start cleaning the house a little bit.
Do you have a place where you’re going to back all that up or are you going to delete?
I haven’t even thought that far ahead, Tom. Maybe the newest iPhone gives you more memory and go from there.
When TV first started, nobody kept all that stuff. It’s like, “Who cares? We’re going to do another one next week. It doesn’t matter.” Now when they do find stuff like that, people are always happy.
I did ask Peloton a couple of years ago if they had an archive and if they were keeping all this stuff. I never got a reply. I figure that’s probably some secret that they don’t want to divulge. Maybe they didn’t want to go find out.
They don’t want to deal with a million questions of like, “Did you get my shout out from the pre-roll a few weeks ago?”
I would think it’s lost. It’s too much storage to deal with.
The other thing that I find about you is that you give a lot of high fives.
No one gives more, literally. That’s been quantified.
What can I say? I give good high fives. That was a feature that suited me apparently when they added that, whenever that enhancement was added in the app. That’s the one thing about my level of engagement in the community and the tribe. I love to encourage, to support people to build them up. I like that high five. I love to cheer people on when we’re riding. It’s easy to do and it’s such a simple gesture that sometimes people seem to appreciate.
I love it when I hop on a ride and it always happens the most on a Jenn Sherman ride. Sundays are my day. Whenever I hop on a bike on the ride on a Sunday morning and tons of high fives are being exchanged. It is fun. In my head it’s like “cheers.” You walked into cheers.
I joined the ride in the pre-show, I do a quick round for as many people as I can I get to depending on how many are there and then start getting ready. My system is like when the ride starts, I have my whole following, the people that I follow. I try to high five at least once a song or after a big push and then I go back and expand the whole leaderboard and try to go up and down as much as I can. There could be 80 people that I’m following. It takes a while to get through all those.
It’s hard because especially if there’s a bunch of milestones, which there always are on the Sunday morning ride. You’ve got to go through like, “I’m scrolling. I know. I saw them. Where did they go?”
Jenn has a workout with the milestone shout-outs and birthdays on Sunday mornings.
How many high-fives on average do you give during a 45-minute ride?
I’d say at least 90. I don’t know.
Are you getting extra arm workout from doing it?
That right-hand gets tired out, yes, the high-five hand.
Have you ever accidentally tried to high five somebody while you’re holding a dumbbell for your workouts?
That’s where people get you too. They try to high five you during the upper body. It’s like, “Really?”
I’m like, “I have the dumbbells. What do you want me to do?” I’m trying to high-five with my pinky.
I’m super OCD so it’s like, “Do I try to return it or do I wait?”
It’s hard because it’s mocking you. It’s there and you have to clear it.
It’s lingering and then more notifications pop-ups and then it gets buried further down. It’s your first world problems.
They should disable the high-five during arm work.
Some people try not to overdo with high five, like how we got Nick and Lisa Getty. They’re the OGs that aren’t super into high fives. I try to be respectful of them.
You’ve got to respect the high-five boundary.
Everybody else I bombard. It’s all right. They can deal with it. To circle back when Tom said you could quantify the number of high fives I’ve given. That was a total shock when Alex and Robin shouted me out at the Homecoming celebration.
You had no idea that you were that high up on the list?
No. Earlier that day before the party at the Hammerstein Ballroom for Homecoming, I had gotten this random email from Jayvee Nava with Peloton and she said, “Please come to this entrance of the Hammerstein at so-and-so time.” I showed up there and walked in and they said, “You’re Kenny_Bania. This is so and so Chris with Peloton. He’s going to show you what’s going on. We have something special planned. I can’t tell you what it is.” I said, “How did I get on your radar?” He said, “I can’t give anything away.” He kept it all secret. He walked me over to the stage where they were doing a soundcheck before they started letting everybody into the venue. He said, “You need to stand at this X on the floor at the center of this in front of the stage and be here standing here at 7:45 and I’ll meet you here.” Basically, the party starts when Alex and Robin come out and do their thing. We’re standing there and then I see Alex. He calls somebody out stage right for however many, like 5,000 rides, some crazy number of rides. I realized he’s going to shout me out and I had no idea what he was going to shout me out for. The spotlight comes on me and I hear him go, “Where’s John also known as Kenny_Bania?” I hear him and I’m like, “He got the leaderboard name wrong.” You put the high five hand up and he goes, “He’s given out over 61,000 high fives,” and everyone starts cheering and high fiving me. That was cool.
I think that means that you got closer to any of the instructors that night than anybody else.
You guys were in there, weren’t you?
Yes. I remember you walked up to us and took a selfie with us randomly. You didn’t say anything else. You were like, “Quick selfie,” took it and you were gone.
I don’t even remember that. I remember meeting you guys when I was riding the lounge bike at the studio and you were standing nearby and I shouted, “Clip Out.”
I don’t remember that.
I’m like, “I’m Kenny_Bania.” Crystal is probably all like, “Backup slowly, Tom.” I waved to you guys randomly when I was probably trying to get another ride in to make sure I reached a milestone while I was in town.
Do you think you’re going to be able to repeat it?
I don’t know. It’ll be interesting to see if they’re still keeping count.
Maybe you’ve inspired a competitor.
There are a lot of other big high fivers out there. The competition is stiff. It was fun. The following day when I rode with Jenn Sherman for the Homecoming ride, I was talking to her about that moment and she goes, “We were doing a rehearsal for that. When they said your name wrong, I walked up to him. I was like, it’s Kenny_Bania,” and they still got it wrong. It would have been cool if it had been her shouting out. Alex and Robin are pretty awesome too.
Is that a sports thing? What is Kenny_Bania?
Kenny_Bania is a character on Seinfeld.
I was thinking is that a Seinfeld thing? I remembered a Bania character but I’ve never seen it spelled, so I didn’t know it was spelled weird.
He’s one of the supporting characters on Seinfeld who’s this bad comedian.
He’s the guy that that converted to Judaism so he could make jokes about being Jewish.
That was Tim Whatley, Tom.
I haven’t watched Seinfeld since it was on for the first time.
That was Tim Whatley played by Bryan Cranston, the dentist who converted to Judaism for the jokes. Kenny Bania was this bad comedian that Jerry despised. He was oblivious to it. I always thought he was funny and he always had these awful jokes. Jerry in one episode, helps him with his material and he’s going, “That’s gold, Jerry.” There’s an episode, which is my favorite Seinfeld episode, where Kenny bumps into Jerry and he tells him he’s got a brand-new Armani suit that he outgrew that he can’t wear and he offers it to Jerry. Jerry was like, “Okay, whatever. I’ll take the suit.” In the end, Kenny’s like, “You can take me out for dinner some time.” Jerry’s like, “Okay, I’ll take you out for dinner.” They go out to dinner at this restaurant called Mendy’s, but then Kenny says he’s not hungry, he’s going to order soup. He’s going to save the meal for another time. They go into this big argument. Jerry goes, “No, Bania. The soup counts. Soup as a meal,” and Kenny’s all, “The soup is not a meal.” A lot of times that’s what my location field, my leaderboard name reads, “Soup is not a meal.”
We have a big Seinfeld fan here.
That had to be a Larry David story idea. It’s got Curb Your Enthusiasm written all over it.
It’s some personal story to them, I’m sure.
Do you watch Curb?
I do. I watched a random episode from the season with Lin-Manuel Miranda from Hamilton because the next season’s coming back.
I like Curb better than Seinfeld.
My Curb knowledge, I don’t have the deep Curb pull out of your ass references as I do with Seinfeld.
I like Seinfeld, but I didn’t like the Kramer stuff. The Kramer stuff in Seinfeld was too broad for me. I like Curb because it’s much like Seinfeld but without Kramer. It’s more of the cynical aspect of Seinfeld, which is fine for me.
My eyes glazed over a little. I love Larry David. He’s great. I love Seinfeld, but you guys love it more than I do. Tell us about the shirts that you made. You have to describe it first because Tom probably hasn’t seen it or he doesn’t know if he’s seen it unless it’s been pointed out specifically to him. He wouldn’t have known. There are probably readers who have no idea what I’m talking about. You have to describe it first.
You need the visual and I know I’ve sent you some pictures, Crystal. You can get a better sense. Everything that we buy now, there are some random targeted ads that pop up in your feed randomly. I don’t know if it was Facebook or Instagram, but it was this custom shirt company, custom clothing apparel company where you could put a face shot of somebody plastered all over the shirt. It’s like one face 100 times over every inch of the fabric. I see this ad pop up and this is when I’m deep in Cody World and the #BooCrew Tribe posting compilations and funny Cody videos all the time. I randomly post a screenshot of the ad to the #BooCrew page and I said, “Please tell me why I shouldn’t get a shirt of this with Cody’s face all over it made.” Pretty much everyone’s like, “You’ve got to do it.” They dared me and I ordered it. I got it. My wife took a picture of me on the Bike after I received it. They got a big kick out of it. My wife and I and son and in-laws, we went to Disney World and I worked around Disney World. I posted a picture of us in front of the castle, that traditional picture you always take in Disney World in front of the big castle. I was like, “That’s right. I wore my Cody tank here. I am 100% that Disney bitch.” People got a kick out of that.
There are other instructors that you’ve done this for.
Cody was the first and then Jenn Sherman is my absolute favorite instructor and Cody and Denis. I got a bike shortly after that. I ordered one of Denis and one of Jenn’s shirts and posted those. I was back in New Jersey visiting my mom and sister and brother-in-law. My wife and I rode in the studio with Jenn on Sunday morning and the first ride that we did with her, the Best of the Decade ride, I walked in wearing the Jenn shirt and my wife and I was on bike 5 and 6. We were dead center.
We couldn’t miss you because I was where I was riding and I was like, “That’s a lot of Jenn.”
I posted the pre-show clip after the ride. Jenn was like, “Look at this guy just slipping into town.” She was like, “Is that me all over that?” She’s like, “How are you doing Jenn Sherman, all 30 of you there?” She thought it was funny and she looked a little frightened.
I was like, “Does this end with a restraining order?”
I haven’t been served yet, so I think we’re good. I’d probably get one for Cody soon.
I think they’re okay as long as you don’t try and resell them.
That’s it for the shirts though. It was fun. I haven’t had a chance to ride since I got them to ride in the studio with Cody or Denis, but I’m going back for Jenn’s Men ride and hopefully, I’ll be able to do a Denis ride and a Cody one and rock the shirts.
I’m telling you, capture that ride. If it gets deleted, that’s a 401(k) in your pocket. I understand you have to pretend like it’s a dumb idea because of Peloton, but you and I, we know.
Do you do any of the other Peloton workouts or do you stick to the bike?
I’m mainly just the bike. I don’t have any excuse not to take it. I need to take advantage of the other content. I’m ashamed to admit I’ve never done a yoga class with Denis, which is ridiculous because he’s awesome. I’ve maybe done one sleep meditation, but I’m not a runner, so I’ve never done any of the running classes. We’ve traveled and I’ve used the app when I had to use a shitty hotel fitness room spin bike. It’s nice having that option.
Crystal, you’ve done the sleep meditation at a time or two. It was upsetting. The one time she said she was doing a sleep meditation and did you know how the room gets quiet and you can hear it bleeding through the headphones? It was my other podcast. She’s pitiful.
It’s the perfect cure for insomnia.
I was trying to drown out your snoring.
Sometimes I nod off during my other show. The joke’s on you.
You’ve said who your favorite instructor is, but it sounds like you have a few favorites.
Cody was my first ride even before we got the bike. Basically, Denis had started with Peloton after we got the bike right before and he got me hooked on it. I joined his tribe, Denis’s Menaces quickly thereafter. I had a total man-crush on him. When he came, we lived in Austin. He came to the Austin showroom maybe a couple of months after we had gotten the bike to do the little meet and greet. I dragged my wife there. She didn’t want to go, she doesn’t ride with Denis. I dragged my wife and son there. I was totally fanboying. This was when his hair was probably four feet shorter than it is now. It was super short. He’s full Fabio now with the hair at its length and its current way. Soon after that, I discovered Jenn Sherman. I remember taking a Green Day ride. Back then, I didn’t ride live. I was a totally new, super-intimidated to ride live, to open up the leaderboard. I’ve come a long way. From there, I did this on-demand Jenn ride. It was a Green Day ride. I remember posting in the OPP about it, taking a Jenn ride for the first time. She connected well with the people in the studio and with the people ratting at home.
I was impressed with the way she commanded the leaderboard and went through the whole ride. From there, I love riding with her. In January of 2018, I finally got to ride in the studio and my first ride was with Denis. A couple of days later, it was with Jenn and it was an ‘80s ride, which is amazingly still on-demand and available. I rode with her on bike 6. I wore my Kool-Aid shirt and I had University of Michigan headbands and wristbands on. I was smiling ear-to-ear. It was an amazing experience. We talked afterwards and we’re both huge Howard Stern fans. We both grew up in New Jersey. We love the Grateful Dead. She has similar interests that we vibed well.
Do you feel like your favorite tribes match up with your favorite instructors or do you have other tribes that rise to the top?
The main tribe I would say is the JSS Tribe. I have some of my closest Pelo friends who are also in the Menaces and the #BooCrew. That’s where I’d say I have many great friendships that have formed since I joined the community in the JSS Tribe. I’ve gone Homecoming. I went to the JSS Tribe party, which I missed all of it because I was busy taking a Cody ride at the studio. I had to ride with Boo and I’m getting my ride in with Cody.
It’s hard to pick your priorities on Homecoming weekend.
It was like Sophie’s Choice there. I’m definitely closest to JSS Tribe with the folks there that I’ve gotten to know well like Janet Barr. I haven’t met Howard Godden and he’s the one person I haven’t met in person.
How is that possible?
Every time I’m in town, even at Homecoming, our paths didn’t cross. He was out of town when we were in the studio. He’s one of those people I have not met yet. I haven’t met Lisa Getty yet. She wasn’t at Homecoming. A lot of close friends. Another good friend from that tribe, Nicole Rachetti, Nikki_Pelos_For_Pizza. She’s my Phish, The Grateful Dead, Peloton friend. Whenever Jenn plays The Grateful Dead, we’re messaging each other. A lot of good friends in the Menaces. The #BooCrew page, I’m probably most active of the tribe page because I’m always posting something Cody-related to that page in addition to the OPP.
What state do you live in now?
Now we’re in the Ann Arbor, Michigan area in a town called Kenton, right next to Ann Arbor. My wife is from Ann Arbor and grew up here and went to Michigan. Our folks live down the road from us.
How often do you get to the studio? It sounds like fairly often for living far away.
I wish it was more often. It’s maybe once, twice a year if I’m lucky. When I go back to visit because I’m from Northern New Jersey originally, a little town called Summit. My sister still lives there and my mom’s there. We were there after Christmas and then I’ll be going back maybe twice for Jenn’s Men and maybe hopefully Homecoming. My mom tries to lure me back now to visit. She’s like, “You can go into the studio.” The fun thing was when we rode on a Sunday morning, my mom drove in with our son, our 7.5-year-old son Jackson. She drove into the city and brought him after the football ride ended. My mom got to meet Jenn, my son also got to meet Jenn and my wife met her for the first time as well when we rode together. My son loves Cody. He loves to say, “I’m going to snatch your wig.” The first thing he said to Jenn when he met her was, “Where’s Cody?” Jenn’s response was, “He’s probably still in bed from partying all night.” I jokingly refer to Jenn Sherman to my wife as my wife from another life because another lifetime, we totally would have hit it off because we have so much in common. I took a picture of just Jenn and my wife and I was like, “My two girls right here.” She knows how much I love Jenn.
You have an understanding wife.
We have a healthy relationship.
Do you have any advice for people getting their bikes?
This would have been great had I had it when I first got the bike and had taken it. I would say to the newcomers, don’t compare yourself. Everyone is from all levels of experience and walks of life. Don’t feel intimidated when you’re riding when you see someone with crazy numbers, crazy output. Like Cody says, it’s not that deep. Don’t take it seriously. The great thing is the community because when we first got the Peloton, we thought we were getting a bike. We had no idea of the community and all the friendships that awaited us. Embrace that community. Find your tribe once you gravitate towards an instructor or instructors. Seep yourself in that because there’s a lot of amazing people and there are many great things about it and it’s so much more than a bike.
Where can people find you on social media if you would like to be found? I have a feeling you would like to be found.
I have a public Instagram, which is a lot of Cody in there, as we know. I post everything that I post to the OPP on Instagram. It’s @JohnPrewitt. I also post all the compilations. I’ve got Denis compilations, Jenn Sherman compilations. I think I’m up to part 27 of Cody compilations, all on YouTube. My channel is PrewittJ1. There is a lot of good stuff on there.
That’s a lot of cool content for people. Stuff if you probably don’t always see, especially if you’re not taking live rides.
The Cody compilations I always put out usually every Friday. Friday seems to be a good day to put that out there. People seem to enjoy it. The one thing that I like about doing them is a lot of people are riding with them with Jenn or with Cody for the first time. I love seeing the comments like, “I haven’t taken a Cody ride yet.” His Backstreet Boys compilation inspired me to ride with him. I love it. I’ve given him free promotion there, so I’m sure he doesn’t mind. I’m working on a Jenn Sherman one. I put together a couple of pre-show compilations for Cody of pre-show moments that are a lot of fun. Usually, it’s comedic relief, but whenever there’s a cool, inspiring moment or funny, I’ll post that or I’ll add it into a compilation. As I’m riding, something happens, I make a quick note on my phone, the time and the moment and then I do a quick screen recording later in the day and splice it all together at some point and there it is.
Thank you for doing that. Those moments, they’re not captured. A lot of times, we’re taking a ride. It’s nice to have it captured in that way.
It’s a lot of fun. People seem to enjoy it. I’ll keep on doing it as long as people want to see it.
Thank you so much for taking the time out of your schedule to join us.
It’s good talking to you.
Important Links:
- Apple podcasts – The Clip Out
- Facebook.com/theclipout
- John Foley
- #CEI2020 on Twitter
- GearPatrol.com
- DailyMaverick.co.za
- Create & Cultivate 100
- John Prewitt
- Official Peloton Page – Facebook
- PrewittJ1 – John Prewitt’s YouTube channel
- Denis’s Menaces – Facebook Group
- JSS Tribe – Facebook Group
- #BooCrew – Facebook Group
- @JohnPrewitt – Instagram
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