• John Mills joins us to discuss Peloton ending its video chat feature.
• The rent-a-bike program is now available nationwide.
• Dr. Jenn – Preventing depression and anxiety from impacting your consistency.
• Time Magazine takes us behind the scenes of being an instructor.
• Ebony Magazine spotlights Dr. Chelsea Jackson Roberts.
• Cody Rigsby explains why self-care is important during Pride Month.
• Cody was on the Primal Kitchen Podcast.
• Amazon Editors name Tunde’s Speak one of the Best Books of 2022 So Far.
• Chelsea Jackson Roberts, Kirra Michelle, and Marian Fernandez celebrated International Yoga Day.
• Matty Maggiacomo has a new episode of Out Loud.
• Olivia Amato was on The Adam Schein Podcast.
• Kirsten Ferguson had a pool party and Anna Greenberg and Callie Gullickson had IG posts about it.
• Callie has started her own YouTube channel.
• Leanne Hainsby offered condolences to X Factor star Lewis Capaldi.
• Ally Love was spotted at the 2022 Ailey Spirit Gala.
• Ally Love has a new podcast – Courtside Conversations.
• Peloton has a secret offer for people who have stopped using Peloton.
• Peloton has a whole slew of new patents.
• A Cloudflare outage temporarily shuts down Peloton.
• You can now ride in stores every Friday this summer.
• Fortune writes about all the top-notch C-Suite leaders (including former Peloton) looking for work.
• Seeking Alpha has advice for Peloton.
• The latest Artist Series features Milky Chance and a Muhammad Ali shadow boxing class.
• Angelo joins us to discuss overeating healthy foods. Too much of a good thing?
• A-Rod has a Peloton on his boat.
• Peloton released a new capsule collection.
• Nico Sarani celebrated the anniversary of her first English Live Flow from NYC.
• Sam Yo has an ’80s ride that will appeal to fans of Top Gun.

All this plus our interview with Muriel Wilkins & Felecia White!

—

Watch the episode here

 

Listen to the podcast here

 

Peloton Kills Video Chat Feature Plus Our Interview With Muriel Wilkins & Felecia White

You are better. You’re back into your regular exercise regimen.

I’ve got my running program back. I’m doing my speed work. I’m doing my mid-distance day. I’ve got my long day planned for Saturday. I’ve got my Tonal back on. I’m doing the programs plus getting lean. It’s tough and I love it. I am all back.

We managed. We can safely say that nobody else in the house got it because of you or because you had it.

All I did was ruin our trip to Hawaii.

No big deal. There are certainly people who have had significantly worse outcomes from COVID and we had the insurance. We should also say our Patreon, where you can get these ad-free, Patreon.com/TheClipOut. We just released our first bonus episode. It’s like 10 to 15 minutes long, talking about what’s going on behind the scenes and in the world of the O’Keefes. We bought an electric car. We’re officially hippies.

If you want to hear about it, you have to go over there.

It’s all over there. That’s our media recommendations for what’s on streaming. If you want to watch what we’re watching, that’s over there. It’s that stuff. If you have any thoughts on other things you would like to hear from us, you can chime in over there as well. What pray tell do you have in store for people?

We have our big interview with Muriel Wilkins and Felecia White from the BGM Tread group. They are here to talk about the group and all kinds of fun Peloton stuff. We’re going to have that interview. We also have John Mills joining us and we are going to be chatting about video chat ending on Peloton. We’re also going to touch base on the rented bike program. Dr. Jenn stops by. This is a biggie. We are talking about preventing depression and anxiety from impacting your fitness consistency.

We have a bunch of instructor news. We have a bunch of things that they are present in. We have Peloton news. we’re going to hit. Angelo from MetPro stops by and we talk about how you can have too much of a good thing overeating, even if it’s healthy food. We’ll be talking about artist series and celebrity sightings and all that good stuff.

Before we get to all that, shameless plugs. Don’t forget, we’re available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and Google Podcasts. Wherever you get a podcast, you can find us. While you’re there, be sure and follow us so you never miss an episode. Maybe leave a review. That’s always helpful. We have a new review. This is from Mel KB2. I’ve now reached a point in my life where when I see the name, Mel, I assume it’s a woman. They used to be a man’s name.

It’s usually short for Melanie.

The more I see it, somehow that shifted and now I think it’s a woman. If you’re not, I apologize but I bet you are. If you’re not, maybe think about it. Maybe you actually are, you never know. Just putting that out there. Mel says, “The best way to start my weekend. I’ve been listening to The Clip Out for over a couple of years now, and it has easily become my favorite podcast.

I look forward to my drive to work on Fridays. I’m a glorified Peloton nerd and I can’t get enough of all the news and information Crystal and Tom provide. Crystal and Tom have chemistry and energy that always makes me feel happy. Thank you for bringing the latest in the world of Peloton to us each week.” Thank you very much for the kind words. We appreciate it.

Thank you so much.

You can also find us on Facebook, Facebook.com/TheClipOut. While you’re there, like the page and join the group. As we mentioned earlier, we have a Patreon, Patreon.com/TheClipOut. For $5 a month. You get ad-free content. If you go up a level, you get bonus content and stuff like that. You can also sign up for our newsletter at theclipout.com, where you’ll have all the links and stuff sent to you and stay up to date on the latest happenings. If something important happens with us, you’ll get an email directly. Finally, our YouTube channel, YouTube.com/TheClipOut, where you can watch all of these now in color. There’s all that. Let’s dig in. Shall we?

We shall.

—

Joining us is John Mills from Run, Lift and Live. How is it going?

How is it going? What’s going on?

I love the energy. That’s awesome. I got to ask, how was the big Juneteenth presentation? I’ve been dying to hear.

It was awesome. There were a few Peloton friends that came. That was cool. Janice drove down from Boston to be a part of it. It touched my heart. A few people that were local came through. That was cool. A lot of people in there. I don’t know how many, 70 to 80 people showed up for it.

It was nice. I used to tell them the story in written form. I did the thing with a high school or with the students at Wesleyan. It tends to be much more intimate and I don’t tend to have slides, but this is the first time I was presenting imagery. They are images while I’m talking through these stories of the events as they occurred when I was finding cemeteries or finding documentation. I probably should do it that way more often because I got more reactions. People were shocked and you see their gasps.

Was it because of the imagery? The imagery is shocking. That makes total sense. You seemed nervous. Were you nervous when it started?

Immediately as it started, but as I got into it, that went away.

It always does. At least lessons. For me, maybe that goes all the way out the window but it’ll start here. It goes much better than you expect. That starts to come down the level it does.

You’re like, “They’re not throwing things at me.”

There was one woman. She was joking. She’s in the second row. She heckles me. She’s like, “This better be good.” I was like, “I hope it will be.”

Historical Society is rough. Did Historical Society have two drinks minimum? What’s going on there?

You should have said, “Why don’t you come up here and do it?”

It went well extremely well, much better than I could have ever imagined. I am hyped.

That is wonderful. You have another event coming up.

That’s for Northwestern University in Illinois. They asked me to speak and tell the same story there last time. This is a two-plus hour lecture for the museum. I had to cut it down because I only had an hour and a half. I was stressing about that. I’m like, “How am I going to keep this an hour and a half? I don’t know how to do that.” I went for an hour and 35 minutes. I’m right there. For Friday I got to figure out how to get it down to 50 minutes. That’s my stress now. I’m trying to figure out how I will condense this into 50 minutes.

Tell them a cliffhanger and make them invite you back.

We’ll see how this plays. I’ve been looking at slides. I’m like, “I don’t need that one. Maybe I do. I need this one.” I’ve been stressed.

That’s rough. I wrote a short story a few years ago that I did a public reading of. They wanted the reading portion to be shorter, so then I had to go through and trim it. That was hard to figure out. You spend so much time crafting it and then you’re like, “Now I got to cut out 30% just because.”

That’s what I’m going through. I’m struggling with that. I’m struggling to make sure that the story still tells appropriately as you’re eliminating components like, does it marry?

You all of a sudden end up referencing something that they haven’t heard about.

That’s freaking me out, but anyway, we’ll see.

Good luck on that one too. It’s cool that you’re doing all this. It’s going to pay off dividends for generations to come.

This one is cool though. They have a couple of doctors that are going to be speaking after I speak. I marry my experience along with my research and what my psyche was like growing up and how this affected it. They see that as a common thing so they’re going to be talking to that after I speak. That’ll be neat. Also, it’s free. It’s online. Anybody can register and watch it. I’m posting the link in a bunch of places.

Would you mind sending that to me so I could include it?

 

It’s on Friday at 2:00 Eastern, 1:00 Central.

If you don’t mind, message it to me and I’ll post it in the group. By the time this is published, it will have already occurred.

I’ll send it to you. Thank you. There was a post buried in the comment section on the OPP that was a bit of a bombshell for some people. Peloton is killing the video chat feature on the bike and tread.

Dr. Jenn is not happy because she and I do this every Saturday. We put up the video chat while we were running. Even though we’re not talking, it’s nice to know that the other person is there. She’s upset about it. Did you guys see that there was an update to this as well?

I didn’t see the update.

The image said from Peloton, “We’re turning this off so that we can work on feature enhancements, such as the friends option that is going to give you new ways to interact with and ride with your friends in the future.” Here’s my thought. Do you remember back in the day when everybody used to do rides together? Before there were sessions and there was a way to do Just Ride, they would pick a ride and everybody started at the same time. Do you remember that? Do you remember one day they turned it off without telling anybody and there was chaos?

Fast forward several months later, I don’t remember exactly how long, but that’s when the high-five feature came out, and then you could ride again and there were sessions and all of that stuff. they created a new way for us all to connect. My theory is that’s why the video chat is going away because they’re taking it offline to make changes and enhancements to that specific feature. It’s not like it’s gone forever. It’s gone forever in the way that we are used to it now, I’m hoping.

What enhancements can they make? There’s either a camera pointed at your mug or there is not.

It’s what the camera does because it’s software. The camera is a camera. You can’t change that. What the camera does could change, I don’t know. Maybe we could put filters on now.

Here’s a throwback. You can finally get your sexy people filter. Much to everyone’s amazement, it’s not the filter, sexy people. It’s to make you sexy people.

Maybe you can now virtually flip people off like you’re riding and we wanted to be able to pass on the left.

I hope that’s what it is. That would be nice. I was thinking a bunch of things when I saw this. Number one, are they thinking that this is just a feature that no one is using? Because it’s random. All of a sudden in the middle of a post, Peloton goes, “We’re getting rid of that.” Were they thinking no one uses this, so nobody would care?

Most comments seem to be, “This thing is pointless” or “I’ve never used it.”

To be fair, they did. That was most of it.

That was my first thought. The idea that the Peloton is now suggesting that they may be coming up with something new is intriguing. I know they did this before, but why do you have to turn it off? Don’t you build something and cut over? Do you have to turn it off?

What’s the selling point for, “It’s gone now?”

I don’t think it’s a selling point. I think it is an engineering necessity. Do you remember the earnings call when Barry was like, “We got this major problem with our entire system and it all sucks?” I’m paraphrasing.

Do you think it is a security issue?

I don’t think it’s a security issue. I think that to be able to make changes to it, they have to do it in the live database. When you make software changes, and you know all about this, John, you got your test database and then you’ve got your real database. To be able to use it, they’ve got to take it offline from the real database. They’ve been testing it in the test database, but now they’ve got to do it in the real database. I don’t even know if any of that makes sense. It makes sense up here to me.

He did talk about there being issues with regards to them and their test environments and something relative to that. Maybe there’s something very specific to them or a limitation very specific to how they set this up that causes this to be. That could be it, which would explain the last time they took away our ability to ride with each other at the same time, and then it comes back. Maybe that’s it.

That’s my theory. I’m sticking to it.

The real indicator will be in a few months or maybe a year as you see more and more bikes getting pushed out, they stop having cameras on them.

If they have no intention of using the video chat feature, the only purpose that camera would serve is to take a profile picture, which I got think almost nobody does because they would rather use the one from their social media platform of choice that’s going to look nicer. That’s going to shave on their end a couple of hundred bucks off the bike if they can ditch that camera.

My hope is that you’re going to be able to do this invite friends thing and be able to have multiple people chatting at a time. That would be so cool.

I thought I heard something about using the Guide on the bike. I don’t know if it was a survey.

I did see that. Supposedly there’s a survey out there and they’re asking questions, but they do these surveys all the time. Even when they do them it’s months before anything happens. Even if that’s a thing, I think we got some time.

The reason I mentioned that is we’re talking about two cameras here, the Guide and the camera on the screen.

That is something that people kept bringing up. After I posted that it was going away, a lot of people said, “I wonder if they’re taking it offline because they’re bringing the Guide camera to the bike and the tread.” Maybe, I don’t know.

That’s not a bad thought when you’re talking about they have to test the software if they want to make Guide functionality work on the bike and tread through that camera, especially on Bike+ since it swivels. That would be a pretty major software rewrite, one would think.

It’s an interesting thing. My first initial thought was, “Who’s using that? Get rid of it.”

“What kind of weirdos are using that?” Crystal and the cheer fairy.

Dr. Jenn uses it too.

Does the cheer fairy still do that? I feel like it’s been a while since I’ve heard any discussion about that.

I don’t know. She did chime in on your comment. She said that she didn’t think that people found it valuable anymore even though Peloton had it on their bikes. That’s all she said. She didn’t comment like, “I still do this. I don’t do this.” She didn’t weigh in either way. I’m not sure. Maybe she does it with her closest friends.

John Foley called me once on the bike. I always have a big screen and the speakers are going. It completely drowns out anything that may be coming through that monitor. He calls me and I couldn’t hear anything. I saw him doing this and he’s talking. I don’t know what he said. He didn’t know what I said. We didn’t know when to hang up.

Here’s the sad part. Do you know what he said to you? He said, “Sell at 160.” You missed your shot. That’s a shame. We should probably say to people that the functionality of the video chat sounds like it’s going to work through the 27th. If you hop on your bike and it’s still doing it and you’re like, “They don’t know what they’re talking about,” it’s coming. We should also talk about the fact that the Rent a Bike or Bike+ is now a nationwide program.

It’s in all ZIP codes, ours included. I checked. You can get it.

You know it’s available everywhere if it’s available here because we have everything last. We just got penicillin. That’s how bad it is.

I looked up our ZIP code and they said that it would be available. It was available very quickly. Just a reminder, if anyone out there is interested in this, you can not have anybody in your household already using the Bike or Bike+ with the contract. There’s a time period on it. You got to be a brand new customer. You cannot be in a trial period. If you had bought a bike and you were like, “I can return it in 100 days or 90 days, wherever they’re at currently, you are not eligible for this. You got to be a new member.

I got questions. This is what I thought when I saw it. I know they had been playing with the price point, but it looks like they settled in on the Bike at $89 a month, Bike+ at $109 a month. I know they’ve done the analytics and they’ve done the due diligence. I’m sure they’ve come to the conclusion that that is the right price point to get the numbers that they want. When I look at that, I keep thinking, “Would they really do that, $90 for the Bike a month?”

One of our rules is, “This is not a place to talk about the bike.” If you are not an active Peloton Tread workout person, this is not the place for you. Share on X

It does include your all-access membership.

You didn’t have to pay anything out of pocket.

What’s the difference between this and no interest?

Right now, you’re renting so you don’t own it. There’s never a time that you own it unless you could say, “I want to go ahead and do a buyout.” It’s like a lease for a car.

At some point though, you paid in full and then you own it and it will drop to $45 a month. If you don’t say anything, they’ll let you keep this bike for ten years and keep paying $89 a month, even though you have paid five times what the bike is worth.

Let’s say you did that and in two years they come out with a new one, I think you get the new one.

That’s what I would assume. I haven’t actually heard it but that’s what I’m assuming. It looked like a year is where you have that option of, “I want to buy it,” and everything you’ve already put towards it. Now it goes to that purchase. It’s like you bought it from day one.

I still don’t get what the difference is between that and doing the interest-free purchase of the bike. What’s the monthly payment on that?

I don’t know anymore because they keep changing the price. It depends on if you did a two-year or three-year. I don’t even know if they offer the three-year anymore because they’ve changed that too.

I don’t know what it was. I don’t remember what the numbers are so I can’t speculate on it, but I hear you, Tom.

I guess if you don’t have the credit.

Also, if you’re living somewhere for a year. This is great for college students. I picture this as somebody in school or somebody who has an apartment and they don’t know where they’re going to be in two years. They don’t want to buy a bike. I’m picturing that person. That’s the only use I can think of that would be good for this.

I’m trying to do the math. If $45 a month times, 12 months, it’s $1,100.

It ends up being the same. Somebody did the math and said that it ends up being the exact same or real close.

I was not even close. It was $540 a month. That’s why I’m a Mass Communications major. Just a reminder, I didn’t graduate from college until I was 45 because I had to take a math class. It just proves that. Even then, if you bought the bike for $1,100, you could buy it and then sell it. That’s trouble to deal with. I don’t know, but clearly, they must have found that there are people out there that want this version of a deal.

They wouldn’t keep expanding it if they didn’t.

That’s what I’m thinking. They put this in a few markets and then expand it. They were adjusting the price and came to this conclusion. I guess it’s right but I’m not quite sure I get it.

Maybe it’s for people who have the money and they don’t care that much about the money. They don’t want to overspend, but they want an out. They don’t want to be stuck with what people would refer to as a paperweight. They’ve said that for years. This is for the person that’s like, “I don’t want to think about it. Bring it here and if I say get it out of here, I want it out of here.”

Four months in, if I go, “This is whack,” they’ll just take it and I’m done.

If you keep it for very long and they come out with a new bike, you can trade it out for the new bike with no camera. That’s so that’s a win-win.

I would keep this if it had no camera.

Joe Biden probably would have been happy about that.

No camera and they imaged it as the presidential model like a presidential suite. Secret Service approved.

Now I’m going to be on the lookout for the presidential Bike and the presidential Bike+.

You can’t fall off from one of these.

There’s a whole bunch of cameras around that bike.

It was like, “Biden can’t fall off and no cameras? I’m in.” Thank you so much for joining us, John. Until next time, where can people find you?

They can find me on my Facebook page or group, Run, Lift and Live. They can find me on Instagram @RunLiftAndLive. They can find me on TikTok, Run, Lift and Live, or they can find me at RunLiftAndLive.com.

—

An article that came from Time Magazine, which is not nothing, The Big Business of Being a Peloton Instructor.

I enjoyed reading this article. It talks about the instructors and how they have become these giant superstars and they do so much. We all know that because we’re very integrated into the Peloton community. We’re very familiar, but not everybody is. I feel like the real story around this article isn’t the instructors. The real story is how people responded to this article. I would think that it would be pretty positive, but it was split.

You had some people that were positive and very much like, “Of course, the instructors are amazing. I know that.” You then had this other contingent who focused on the fact that it was coming from leadership and some of the quotes rubbed people the wrong way. One comment I saw said that the way Barry’s quote talked about the instructors was like he owned them.

There were other people congratulating themselves on how awesome the instructors are like they could take credit for those instructors and how awesome they are. I thought that was interesting, the split. I know there are always people who are unhappy about everything. They always got to complain. I don’t know how big of a deal it is. It’s interesting that it had such a reaction.

Somebody is picking these instructors. Somebody is casting them, curating them, and they’ve got a pretty good track record. It’s like being a casting director on a film. It’s obvious to be like, “I want Tom Hanks in my movie.” Sure. Is it obvious in 1983? No, it is not obvious in 1980. Somebody had to be like, “This is the guy and we’re going to roll with this.” They’ve done that.

There are like 54 instructors now or something like a deck of cards, but 10 to 12 of them have legit media presences now. There are probably at least 5 to 8 more that are well on their way. It reminds me of the rise of celebrity chefs. There was a period of time when it’s like, “You’re a chef. That’s great. Anyway, go cook my food.” At some point, that shifted and chefs became celebrities. It was because of Alice Cooper’s manager but that’s another story.

You can hear that in the bonus episode.

All of a sudden, somebody had to be the first celebrity chef. Right now, Peloton has all the celebrity chefs.

They do and nobody else comes even close to that.

So far, we’ve seen that when you stop being a Peloton celebrity chef, you go back to being a chef.

Despite how you might want to try to make it look otherwise. It’s also interesting to me that people were not happy that some of these upper-level management people were posting about it and saying, “Look what we did. We were in Time Magazine.” They didn’t like that they were bragging about it. I’m on the side of the Peloton executives in this one. That is not easy to pull off. Just so everybody is aware, you don’t just call a newspaper and say, “I want to have this in the paper,” and they do it for you. It’s a whole thing.

 

Time Magazine will not return our phone calls.

Nor should they, to be honest. It’s not as easy as it sounds. For Peloton to pull that off was a big deal, especially in a year that they’re having a tough year. They deserve some kudos for that.

They don’t get major fluff pieces anymore. Let them have one. Who doesn’t like a good fluff? That’s what I always say.

Congrats to Peloton instructors and the people that pulled off that amazing Time article.

Here’s my next question. Is Time Magazine still a big deal? It used to be like Time Magazine was the pinnacle. Does that carry the same cache now?

Is it the same as it did in the ‘80s? Probably not. Is it the same ratio compared to other magazines that are dying? I think it does. Ratio-wise, it’s great.

It’s still at the checkout when you go to the grocery store. I guess that says something. Speaking of major magazines, Dr. Chelsea Jackson Roberts was featured in Ebony.

They talk about how she modernizes the ancient practice of yoga with a hip-hop soundtrack. One of the things that Peloton does very well is taking unexpected soundtracks and putting them to yoga. They’ve done this with a lot of the different artists’ spotlights that they’ve done and it has been cool. Dr. Chelsea Jackson Roberts is amazing all in her own right and she deserves all of the praise because she is so accessible to everybody. I love the way that she seems so passionate about bringing yoga to everyone.

I also think it’s great for Peloton. One of the ways to draw in more people from that community is to be featured in publications that that community reads. I think that is wonderful.

I absolutely agree. As the instructors say often, representation does matter.

Cody was featured on NewsTodayHeadline.com. Is that a real thing? That sounds like a made-up website. I know technically all websites are made up.

I know what you mean, but it sounds made up and it’s /admin. I don’t know what they’re doing over there.

He’s talking about why self-care is essential during Pride month.

That is important. It’s a good article. It’s not one of those that sounds like a robot wrote it. It’s still short and it’s to the point, but it’s not a robot.

We try to weed out the ones that were created in an AI incubator. While we’re speaking of Cody, he was featured on a podcast called Primal Kitchen.

I don’t know what it is. I didn’t read anything about it. I just saw it. He does talk to the host about moving to North Carolina as a child, how his passion for dancing was ignited after he took a ballet class, and then moved to New York City, and the homelessness that he experienced. There is a lot that he gets deep in. That sounds like very good information.

The Amazon editors have picked the best books of 2022 and Tunde has made their list.

She’s under non-fiction and business and leadership. Congrats to Tunde for her book Speak.

TomsGuide.com spotlights Logan Aldridge.

I have very mixed feelings about Tom’s Guide but I like this particular article.

Was it because they stole my name?

It’s because they give reviews that are good and then bad about the same products. There are different people writing them.

Anybody named Tom can chime in.

This particular article is good. They spoke to Logan Aldridge about his journey into adaptive training and the power of a positive mindset. Definitely check that out. I’m hearing so many good things about Logan. Everybody that has taken classes with him is talking about how amazing he is, nonstop. It’s all good things.

Olivia Amato was on the Adam Shine Podcast.

She talks about her journey to becoming a Peloton instructor, her style of instructing, how she motivates her class, and her collaboration with Joe Jonas.

Kirsten Ferguson had a pool party.

She invited all of the instructors that are in the United States.

It looks like the lion’s share of them showed up.

I did see a few missing, but for the most part, they were there all to celebrate Juneteenth. They had a barbecue and they were all swimming. They were all taking selfies. They had to have the camera set up so they could do their catwalk thing. I guess that’s a thing now that everybody does. It looks like they had a ton of fun, which is great.

Anna Greenberg and Callie Gullickson both had Instagram posts from the party.

You get to see lots of behind the scenes, little snippets, and little movies.

Speaking of Callie Gullickson, she has started her own YouTube channel.

She posted her first episode. She already has almost 1,000 subscribers in 24 hours. She makes her husband blind taste-test Trader Joe’s spices to see if he knows the spices as well as she does. It’s a ten-minute video of torturing her husband. It looks like lots of fun.

This is a sad one here. A guy named Tom Mann has explained he was in the band on X factor UK. He was set to get married to a woman named Dani Hampson and she died the morning of the wedding.

They haven’t published what happened. There are rumors that it was a car accident but it wasn’t. That’s beside the point. The reason we’re sharing this with you is because Ben and Leanne have both expressed publicly their condolences. They knew Danny because she was a backup dancer for the Spice Girls, and so they were all close. If you get a chance to send your condolences, let’s not get in their business and be asking any questions or anything. Send your condolences. I know it’s a very hard time for anybody who knew Dani Hampson. It’s very sudden and awful.

It was the International Day of Yoga.

It was Tuesday. Chelsea Jackson Roberts got to lead a thousand people in yoga in Times Square. Kirra Michel and Mariana Fernandez we’re also helping her lead this class of over a thousand people in the middle of Times Square. Apparently, it was quite the ordeal because it started raining in the middle of their yoga class. Everybody stayed and had a wonderful time. Ross Rayburn was there talking to people, and so was Jess Sims. It’s wonderful to see all the different instructors support each other. I love that.

The coolest moment was when it started to rain and they asked everybody, “Do you want to leave?” They all simultaneously said, “No, I’m going to stay.” Matty Maggiacomo has a new episode of his IG show Out Loud.

It’s on Tuesday, June 23rd. When this is published on Friday, it will have already occurred. If you haven’t gotten a chance to watch it, Matty has been great about posting these. Make sure you check it out.

It's a workout, not a lurk-out. Share on X

The 2022 Ailey Spirit Gala was held and Ally love was spotted there.

They had pictures of a whole bunch of who’s here and who attended. Ally Love was one of them.

Speaking of Ally Love, she has a new podcast, but it’s not a Peloton podcast. It is Courtside Conversation with Ally Love.

You can find it on iHeart and it started on June 2nd. Congratulations to Ally. That’s awesome.

—

Joining us once again is Dr. Jenn Mann, licensed marriage, family and child therapist, and Sports Psychology consultant. She was also a five-year national team member in rhythmic gymnastics, as well as a sports psychologist for USA gymnastics. It’s Dr. Jenn. How’s it going?

It’s good to see you guys.

This is a tough question that we have for you so hang on. It’s more emotional than fitness, so we’ll see how you feel about it. D. Kenny writes in and she says that she is struggling with depression and anxiety. It has been difficult to be consistent. I feel that so much. PMS gets me. Every month, there are at least three days where nothing happens. It’s awful. Is that normal?

Yes, it is normal. If you’re struggling with depression and anxiety or depression or anxiety, it’s very likely to affect you in every aspect of your life. It’s especially your workouts. It’s going to affect you in your relationships, your sleep, the way you eat, and the way you interact with people in every single area. The first thing is seeing a therapist and doing some talks therapy, and having that person help you figure out, are you someone who needs to learn some new tools, new skills, and new ways of thinking, or are you someone who in addition to that, might be appropriate to start some psychotropic medication to help the depression and anxiety.

A lot of people have a lot of shame around that or stigmas, but antidepressants are truly amazing things. I’m super conservative when it comes to medication and mental health. I always feel that the first step is to talk through things to make the unconscious conscious, to learn the tools and learn the skills. There are times when there are some people who are either wired for depression and/or anxiety that need to have that medication in order to be emotionally available to do that therapy work. There are also some people who have been through so much trauma that it has rewired their brains and they need that help.

It’s important for people to understand because there are a lot of misconceptions about antidepressants and those types of medications. It’s not like cocaine where you take it and you get high. There are serotonin reuptake inhibitors or SSRIs. If your brain is uptaking the serotonin appropriately, it will do nothing for you. If you are someone where your brain is not being receptive in the way that it needs to be, it will get you to what was supposed to be your normal baseline. That’s important for people to understand because a lot of people think it’s like recreational drugs, which it is not.

It’s more the equivalent of if you broke your leg and you had a cast, you wouldn’t be down on yourself having a cast because that would be fixing your broken bone and allowing it to heal and allowing it to move in the right direction, instead of where it was broken. It’s the same thing for these kinds of medications. It’s important to be open to that if it’s appropriate for you. The other thing is to look at your lifestyle. Look at what in your lifestyle is exacerbating your depression or anxiety.

Are you taking on too much? Do you not have enough boundaries with your friends and your family? Are you saying yes when you need to say no? Are you allowing yourself the room to get enough sleep? Are you allowing yourself the room to have nutritious feeds that will nourish your brain and help your depression and anxiety? Are you filling up with caffeine and foods that don’t have a lot of nutrients in them that are not helping you, and it may even be making you more anxious?

Also, looking at what’s your support system like and how many people in your life are there helping you and supporting you? Have you shared with your close circle about your depression and anxiety and what your struggles are? When people know, they can come and help you. They are more likely to say, “Let me babysit your kid.” “Why don’t we go for a walk together?” and to be able to support you and help you to have more energy left for your workouts. It is all related to your workout, which is not too surprising. When all those other things are in place, a lot of the time, your workout becomes more of a priority and it feels good to actually workout.

It does help with your depression, being able to get that oxygen to your brain and being able to do something for yourself. You don’t always get the endorphins until you are at a higher level of fitness, but when you do get to the point where you can get those endorphins, that is a great fighter against depression.

It absolutely is. On days like that, I’m always like, “I’m so glad I did it even when I didn’t want to.” Some days, you can’t even convince yourself to do it. It’s just not happening.

I oftentimes try to think, “How do I want to feel when it’s over?” Sometimes it’s starting. You know because we workout together a lot of the time virtually. There is plenty of time when I go, “Let’s do one more foam roll. I need more time. I can’t quite get there.” Once you get there and you press that button, you just start. Once you start, before you know it, it’s over and you always feel glad that you did it.

Even half-ass is better than no-ass. I have permission to do things half-ass. I love that. That’s my takeaway. Thank you so much for joining us. Until next time, where can people find you?

People can find me on social media @DrJennMann, and also in InStyle Magazine online. I have a column called Hump Day With Dr. Jenn that comes out every Wednesday that is all advice.

Thank you.

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Peloton has a secret churn offer going on.

Starting on June 16th, Peloton will start contacting members who have turned and they are offering those people $100 off accessories if they reactivate their all-access membership by Friday, July 15th, 2022. It’s only available to the member who actually gets the email directly from Peloton and their code will be sent separately within 48 hours. All of the codes expire on Monday, August 1st. That’s fascinating.

I also wonder if $100 off accessories is all that much of an enticement. I would think there’s probably a good chance that a large chunk of these people already purchase the accessories.

I wonder if the Guide is considered an accessory. That would be a good deal.

You can get the Guide for $200 at that point.

A little bit less, $179. I have no idea if they are, but that’s an interesting thought. If you could get the weights and you already had the Guide, that might be, but I don’t know that it would entice me to come back if I had left, but I can’t imagine leaving so I’m not the demo.

No churn for you. Paul Bradley, a friend of the show, found some interesting patent information from Peloton.

He is great about watching all of the patents that occur out there. he said that Peloton has been granted eleven design patents on Precor equipment. The other thing is two ex-Precor employees are the inventors but the patents themselves belong to Peloton. When he looks through Precor’s previous patents, there are about 185 of them that had been granted. He thinks that there’s going to be more to come.

The design patents are related to equipment that people have already seen in a gym. Some of the equipment that it includes are the abdominal exercise machine, rear delts, pec fly exercise machine, leg curl, leg press machine, leg extension, chest press, bicep curl machine, and the monitor associated with the Precor machine. I found that whole thing fascinating and wondering if this means that soon, we’re going to see some real conversation about Precor. I’m hoping.

Do you think this is basically all stuff for the commercial space? It’s not indicative of any new home equipment.

I definitely think that. I think that this is them getting their legal ducks in a row to be able to put more information out about the direction of Precor. I hope that’s what this means. I hope it’s an indicator of that.

Peloton had a brief outage and it was not their fault. It was due to Cloudflare.

Cloudflare affects a whole bunch of websites. Discord was down, Just East was down. It was on Tuesday morning. It happened at off times for America. It was 1:00 to 3:00 AM in America. That was the worst of it. I don’t think a lot of people on the US side had a lot of issues, but I do think that there was potential for the UK side to have some issues or the Europe side, I should say. Hopefully, no one had any awful things happen to them like they missed a milestone or anything.

Summer Fridays are here, which means you can ride in the store.

You might remember that all of the stores have been on COVID protocol for a very long time. You have not been able to ride in the stores. You used to be able to go in and ride the bike or tread, or just do milestones with your friends in the stores and we have not been able to do that for a very long time. This summer, starting on June 17th, all Peloton showrooms in the United States and Canada are hosting a summer Friday. You can take live classes that are streamed from the Peloton studios, New York on Fridays at 5:45 PM Eastern throughout the summer. All you have to do is contact your local showroom to book a bike.

Fortune Magazine had an article about how seven of the biggest free agent C-Suite leaders are on the job market right now. Some of them were at Peloton. The people on the list are names that there’s a good chance you would recognize. Jill Woodworth, who recently stepped down as CFO of Peloton, is a name that you probably recognize if you’re a regular listener to the show, and John Foley, who’s a name that you should absolutely recognize. If you don’t, congratulations on your new purchase.

He stepped down as CEO in February. He was the founder. It was his idea. This is his baby.

Do you think he’s really out looking?

I don’t know. He’s still supposedly involved in the day-to-day.

 

I can’t imagine he’s like, “I’m over on this other company now.” I feel like if he did something, it would be starting this new thing like a totally different thing.

I could see that. I could see John going in a whole different direction.

He’s the guy that’s going to turn around and be like, “I’ve revolutionized shoelaces.”

He would do something like that. I could see it.

Seeking Alpha has an article with some unsolicited advice for Peloton to not test the depth of the river with both feet. Honestly, I’ll one-up them. Don’t take a Peloton in a river at all, even 1 foot.

That’s good advice. They were like, “We think Peloton is doing better but we’re not sure. They got a long way to go.” That’s the gist of this.

Congratulations on your clicks.

—

Joining us once again is Angelo from MetPro here to answer your nutrition questions. Hello.

Thanks for having me back.

This is another one that multiple people are struggling with. We have Kristin Terrel and Kate Anthony. Both of them are very stressed about their portion control, in that they have none. They eat healthily but they don’t know how to stop.

They had a bushel of cauliflower.

It’s interesting you should say that, Tom. This is where everyone’s body is made up a little different. Our habits and what satiates and satisfies us are different. There are people that are grazers and they eat a little bit and they’re satisfied. There are people that need to hit bottom before they’re satisfied. If you fall under the category of portion control issues, first off, you are not alone.

I was raised in a household where I would wake up in the morning and pop would be standing on the other side of the counter stirring the giant sauce pot. He’d be wearing his apron and his t-shirts. He’d be getting that pasta sauce ready. He’d walk around the corner and I’d say, “Pop, where are your pants?” He would go all day. He’d say, “I got enjoy my spaghetti tonight.” That was his shtick. He loved spaghetti, but he would have a mountain of it before he was satisfied.

Here’s the thing, research has actually been done on this. On the spot, I don’t remember the specific statistics. I have done quite a bit of the research that has shown here is the principle and the morals of the stories. They have had people’s diets and they have tested the effects of calorie restriction using portion control versus using food substitutions. Here’s what that means. We’re going to ask our group of participants to reduce portions to whatever effect they’re able to. For this group, we’re not going to ask them to reduce their portions. We’re going to ask them to substitute higher-calorie food options for lower-calorie food options.

While I can not on the spur of the moment recall the exact number, it was multiple times more effective for the food substitution group. It was like 2 or 3 times greater calorie reduction from the food substitution group. Don’t take away from this that the answer is don’t worry about portion control because that’s not it. That’s not the take-home. They too reduced their caloric intake. When you can exchange a higher-calorie food for a filling lower-calorie option, it makes up an even greater difference in calories consumed.

Here are some examples. Right out of the gate, I’m going to use two examples of foods that you might not necessarily think would be that far apart, sweet potato or yam versus whole wheat pasta. Both are medium low-glycemic. Both can be a healthy and good source of energy and good carb. The deal is in order to eat enough pasta to consume 45 grams of carbohydrates, you’re getting that serving in a thimble because it’s so calorie-dense, whereas they have to bring in a tow truck to bring you the sweet potato to get you to 45 grams of sweet potato.

You’d be shocked when you actually do the research on different food items and what the calorie density is. That’s why certain foods sometimes get a bad rap. Not because necessarily they’re ultra high-glycemic or they’re bad for you, but because they’re carbohydrate-dense. Carbs we’re talking about because they have the greatest food volume propensity. There can be such a difference. The most iconic example of this is to substitute a starch, which is a carbohydrate, for a vegetable, which is also a carbohydrate. Most people say there’s a problem with that. “I don’t like vegetables as much as the starch,” that’s the problem. Fair enough. Substitute some of it.

Write a list of carbohydrates that you like, and then Google nutritional info for the carbohydrates you like. It will take you five seconds and it’ll pop up. Here’s how much is in a cup of this. Compare the items that you like. If you make a list of 4 or 5 items, what I want you to do is take 2 or 3. The ones that surprise you with how dense they are, eat those a little less commonly. The ones that are lower in carbs, eat those a little bit more. Right out of the gate without any food control, portion control or any of that, you have cut 20% to 25% of your calories and carbohydrates out of dinner.

Combine that with grab your food and put it on a reasonable size plate. Not these troughs that they bring out at the Hungry Heifer restaurant. You got to get a reasonable size plate and that will help the senses and the psychology to eat a reasonable amount. Make sure that vegetables are a third of your plate. If you want to drive home that routine, when you go to a restaurant or when you’re eating at home, before you eat, whatever you’re going to eat, have yourself a side salad first because that will fill you up. As long as you pick a reasonable calorie dressing, it’s going to help satiate you. It’s going to help fill you up.

Now you’ve picked one of the better options for your carbohydrates. You have vegetables and have a balanced meal that includes some protein as well. What you’re going to find is you’re going to be able to eat to the point of satisfaction. When you do the comparison, the calorie content will be radically different. We all know this because we’ve all gone to the restaurant and held up that menu and been shocked to find this one plate here, which is the same food volume as this other plate here, the oatmeal and fruit, except this is 1,450 calories and this one is 500 calories.

When they’ve done studies, what they have found is the number one factor in satiation is actually water content food volume. Fruits have a lot of water content, for example. There are not a whole lot of calories in a bowl of berries or an apple, but because of the water content, it feels more satiating. Because of the nature of that food, you’re not going to be able to eat that and feel satisfied, but when you combine it with other foods, it stretches the food volumes of the rest of the items on your plate.

The other thing is fiber. We all know that when you have high-fiber food, that’s very filling. These are some strategies you can apply when picking meals that you’re making for yourself and the whole family. It is highly effective. That’s why when one of our coaches is working with their clients, the first thing they want to know is, “What are some of your favorite vegetables? What are some of your favorite complex carbs? What are some of your favorite proteins?” People are shocked to know which ones. The coach says, “I want you to focus on these 3 or these 4.” They’re able to cut the calorie content sometimes in half. People don’t even know the difference. You can cut it in half in some cases. Food substitutions can be huge for managing that scenario of eating too many calories because of larger portions.

Thank you so much for all of that stuff. If people would like this sort of stuff custom-made for them in their fitness journey, where can they find you?

If you want to know, “What should I eat? Tell me which ones are good and bad,” it’s MetPro.co/tco. We would be happy to help you out.

Thank you.

—

The latest Artist Series features Milky Chance. Is that a guy or a band?

It’s a duo. I know there’s one of the songs that I have seen on alt radio. This is the first German series.

Are they German?

Supposedly.

All the words were in English because the song I listened to had eight million views. Some of those had a lot.

It did have a lot. It said all of the classes will be in German. It appears to be a German artist’s collaboration. I’ve seen a lot of people say, “What is this?” I’ve also seen a lot of people say, “I didn’t know anybody else like this. I love this.”

We need our Roger Clyne and the Peacemakers class.

I would love that. Please Peloton, Roger Clyne. That would be amazing.

Also, this is Artists Series adjacent. There is a Muhammad Ali shadow boxing class. We’re both a little stumped since he’s not alive. You can’t do it with him.

Are we showing pictures of him in the background? Is it his moves? I’m super confused. To be fair, I didn’t take it. I have no idea. I’m curious.

I can’t help you because it’s sports. All I know about Muhammad Ali is that he once fought Superman.

I bet it’s great. It’s probably some homage to him. Knowing how Peloton does everything, I’m sure it’s wonderful and delightful.

I’m just curious about how you’ll incorporate someone who’s not alive.

Try not to be all things to all people. Stay in your lane, do what you know and like to do, and leave a ton of room for folks to do other stuff. Share on X

Anybody that took this, let us know. What does this mean? I’m not going to be taking it. I’m telling you right now.

Me too.

—

We had a celebrity sighting with Peloton. A-Rod has a picture of himself on his boat with his Peloton. I guess it’s a yacht. As soon as you put a Peloton on a boat, it legally becomes a yacht.

It goes through an immediate change. There was a lot of other exercise equipment in this. This is not a small boat. This is a ginormous boat.

It seems like that would be weird to ride a bike on yachts. I guess they are big enough that you don’t feel the waves as much. I know they have them on cruise ships, but cruise ships are a lot more stable.

I can imagine that when the waters are too choppy, they are probably not out. I don’t think it’s that bad.

We need to test this out. Anyone with a yacht and a Peloton needs to contact us and we will come to explore.

That’s a good idea. We will do a whole special episode. We could do a bonus episode for our Patreons. That will be fun.

That is a good idea. Any Peloton yacht owners, please fly us out there on your private jet and we will test how this feels. It’s our commitment to the listeners.

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There was a capsule collection that was released.

It just dropped. There was no explanation. There was no buildup. There was nothing. I think it’s fascinating. They didn’t have any buildup. There was no explanation. They randomly dropped a capsule collection that was called Into The Sunset. It’s cute, but that’s it. It’s pretty much a tank top, a bra, and a pair of leggings.

Also, Nico Sarani marked the anniversary of her first English live flow from New York City.

I wanted to tell her happy Peloversary.

Finally, if you enjoy Top Gun, Sam Yo has a ride for you.

This was super interesting because the instructor that used to work at Peloton that a lot of people who have listened for a long time will know, Jennifer Jacobs. She had a Top Gun ride that had been out there forever. Apparently, Sam Yo blows that out of the water. I don’t know. I wasn’t there, but it’s all ‘80s ride, 45 minutes.

It leans heavily on the Top Gun soundtrack. You get in the danger zone and plan with the boys. Do you know who would love a Top Gun ride? Dads on Father’s Day. That’s a dad movie.

That isn’t anybody’s movie. If you have not seen Top Gun, Maverick, whatever and you are holding out because you’re like, “The first one was dumb, I’m not going to go see it” or whatever your rationale is, you need to go to the theater and see it in the theater if you can.

Spend the extra money on IMAX. I did not like the first Top Gun at all.

It doesn’t hold up. I did like it at the time. I don’t like it as an adult, but it doesn’t matter because Maverick blows all of it out of the water.

It fixes everything I didn’t like about the first one. It makes it better. Not in an apologetic way, it just makes it better. The action is crazy good. Spend the money. See it at IMAX. It has already made like $1 billion literally. I’m not telling you anything you probably don’t already know, but if you’ve been holding out, do yourself a favor and go see it. Also, Elvis.

I was about to say it. Also, do not sleep on Elvis. That movie, I was so prepared to hate it when Tom told me two and a half hours I have to go sit in a theater to watch Elvis. I don’t even like Elvis. The movie is amazing. Go see it.

I don’t like Elvis either. Tarantino had a cut scene from Pulp Fiction where he talks about like, “Are you an Elvis guy or a Beatles guy. You got to be one or the other.” He was like, “I’m a Beatles guy. Elvis does nothing for me.” That movie was great. You should totally check it out. Somewhere, there’s a four-hour cut. I’m intrigued.

Two and a half hours went by fast. They did not waste one second. It was not like Batman where you felt like you were going to fall asleep and die at the end. For forty-five seconds this man is on a motorcycle. Are you kidding me? This is ridiculous. This is nothing like that.

It is a speeding train in a good way. Check out Elvis.

I guess we switched over to Reel Spoilers.

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We have two guests and I don’t know which name to say first.

Go ahead, Tom. I’m going to see what you’re going to do here.

I was like, “I’ll do it alphabetically,” and then both their names start with a W.” It’s Felecia White and Muriel Wilkins. Welcome to the show.

It’s great to have both of you here. Thank you so much for joining us. I’m going to ask you both questions and we’ll do short answers. I want to hear all about the Tread Tribe that you guys have. Muriel, I’m going to start with you. How did you originally find Peloton and how long ago?

I can’t remember exactly the year but it’s circa 2016, 2017. I found Peloton because I have been a runner for a long time and tore my meniscus. I could not run for close to 12 to 18 months. I was spending a ton of money at another cycling company. It was taking me a bunch of time to get there and get back for a 45-minute class. I saw this thing and I was like, “I can do that.” I got it and then I lived happily Peloton ever after.

Felecia, how about you?

I purchased my bike in 2017. I’m an avid runner. I run a half marathon in every state in the United States. I also had a torn meniscus. I was having problems with my knee. I decided to buy the bike in December of 2017. After I bought the bike, I had a torn meniscus and had surgery right after that. I fell in love. I had seen commercials on television. I want to try it but I knew that I need to pull back a little bit from running so much. That’s where I ended up with the bike.

What’s interesting is you guys both talk about running. You also have an entire group that is called the BGM Tread Tribe. It’s all about the Tread. You guys don’t even talk about the Bike.

One of our rules is this is not a place to talk about the Bike. If you’re not an active Peloton Tread workout person, this is not the place for you.

We had other rooms for that. We have other groups.

This is an offshoot of the Black Girl Magic Peloton Edition.

It’s a spinoff.

 

How did the spinoff come to be?

I got the Tread early on. I remember it was delivered to my house around Christmas after it was released in 2018. I started doing Saturday 60. Back then, it was not set. It’s something crazy that Jess Sims was doing. I couldn’t do it on the weekends because my kids had activities. I remember putting a post in the Black Girl Magic Peloton Edition saying, “Does anybody want to do it with me this Monday, 5:30 AM?” Three people were like, “Me.” I was like, “I’ll message you.”

We got on and before I knew it, it would be ten of us at 5:30 AM on Mondays. It became a Messenger group. The Messenger group grew to 100 people. We’re like, “Maybe we need a Facebook page because Messenger is a little tricky to work with.” That became not only let’s just do whatever crazy stuff happened on Saturday. We then started creating a schedule that we all workout together. It came from both Felecia and I sharing.

The real benefit of being a runner is when you have a pack that runs with you. There’s nothing like it. I was missing that as a runner on the Peloton when maybe 50 people in total own the Tread. I was trying to create that same feeling within the Black Girl Magic Peloton Edition community because that was where my main home was. Eventually, it spun off onto its own little thing. We’re now 3,300 members in that.

Do you feel like a good chunk of them are Tread owners? Are there people who have other treads manufacturers, but they’re using the app?

It’s both. Our only requirement is that you are at least a Peloton app user. If a tread workout is not in your stack, don’t post it. People want to post pictures of their kids. We’re like, “Where’s the stack with the little tread workout in it?” Some of them own a different type of tread. The main thing that brings us together is that they’re all doing Peloton Tread workouts.

Running this group has become a full-time thing for you guys.

We make it fun for sure.

What events have you guys done in the past?

We did a meetup together. We did Kiawah Island half marathon. We have another race scheduled where we’ll meet up. Some of our ladies, we have local group meetups. They will post in our group, share and say, “Let’s get together for a hike, a walk or something like that,” and they would meet up. We try to stay active as well as create weekly schedules within the group that we all run together during the week.

We do challenges too, particularly around some of the causes that are important to our members. We have a June 10th celebration coming up. We’re going to do that in partnership with some of the other Black Tread groups that are out in the Peloton universe. That will be a lot of fun. We do a lot around Black History Month. Even when there was the murder in Moberly, we all came together and ran for that cause as well. We do a lot of things in support of the broader community to support each other.

When you guys say local events, are the members pretty spread out over the United States? I’m picturing 3,000 people. How spread out are they? Is this like a few people or do we got 100 people locally? Tell me more about the local groups.

I’ll give you an example. We did a hiking meet-up. We put in the group, “This one was particularly for the DMV.” Other ladies in Philadelphia, Atlanta or different people may put together and say, “I like to meet up with the group.” We don’t necessarily know how many people are at the time until we advertise. In the DMV, we had about 40 ladies who were interested in coming out. There are many more here in the DMV area. Both Muriel and I are in this area. How many was it, Muriel?

It was like 40 just in Washington DC.

What’s DMV?

Department of Motor Vehicles?

We meet there too. It’s DC, Maryland, and Virginia. We all live there. We are spread out. We even have members who are international. The main thing is we keep it pretty loose around. We’re not going to organize some big meet-ups. One of the things we do is we post at the beginning of race season, “Everybody, what races are you running?” That way, people can figure out who’s at which race, and then they show up together. That’s nice as well.

I’m always complaining because we don’t have cool races in Missouri. I was looking for a fun marathon to do in the Fall. Guess what the big marathon is called in Fall 2022 in St. Louis.

Is it the GO!? I’ve run that one. I’m from St. Louis.

It’s not the GO! That’s the good one in the Spring.

That’s our daily papers marathon.

This is the one called the Missouri Cowbell. That’s what we have in the fall of 2022.

What does one do at the Missouri Cowbell?

I don’t know. I’m not excited to find out. I’m like, “Is there cheese or something?” I don’t even know what that means.

People do ring a lot of bells at races. It’s very motivating.

It’s true. I’m just not excited by the name.

It mystifies me, especially for female runners. They’re like, “Cowbells are motivating you?” I’ve always said the same thing about Dressbarn. Why would a woman shop at a barn? Are you kidding me? Here’s the other thing. Lane Bryant for plus-size women and the abbreviation is LB. Are you kidding me? You’re just mocking people.

It’s like, “Do they have pretty dresses? I’ll go in.” That’s all I put into the thought. Felecia, you’re from St. Louis. How did you get out of here?

I was in the military. I retired. I did twenty years. I settled here in the Maryland area.

You do not look old enough to have worked anywhere for twenty years.

I have. That’s because of running and drinking a lot of water. That’s my key.

I’m bummed to hear you got out of here in the military because it means it’s too late for us.

We’re passed the cutoff, Tom.

Who are we kidding? I couldn’t cut it in the military. I would either die, be court marshaled or maybe both.

She’s like, “Don’t do that.”

She’s like, “You would be bad for our country.”

Tell me what kind of schedule this looks like. Are you guys giving people ideas for classes every day? Do you have options for them? Do you say, “Mix this with the strength or just take these running classes?” Tell me more about that.

Our schedule is weekly. It’s based three days a week. We recommend Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Each workout has a Tread portion, a strength portion, and a ten-minute core. Mondays and Fridays, we give the option to either do a run or a walk. As more people got the tread, we had people who are like, “I don’t run yet or ever but I want to walk.” We piloted also providing a walk option. People liked it. We have runners or walkers. On Wednesdays, the workout is for both. We bring them together. A lot of people hate that because it usually means it’s a walk and a run. If you’ve ever done the walk and runs, they really run.

Every time I do that, I’m like, “This should count as a run.”

We did one with Olivia Amato. It was like 5 minutes of running and 30 seconds of walking. It’s Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We put up a poll and people check it off. If you are doing some other type of program, as long as it’s the same duration and same type of intensity, then we can check it off. It creates a lot of accountability. It creates a lot of shared experiences. That’s what it is. On a monthly basis, we have a fit test. On the first Monday of every month, we do a fit test where you can either do the extra mile. If you’ve graduated from that, it’s a ten-minute extra mile. Once you’ve graduated from that, then you do the 30-minute Matt Wilpers Progression Run, and measure your pace and tempo from time to time. We also use the 20-minute Robin Arzon Strength Test, and a 10-minute Olivia Core. That is the same every month.

Running can be a solitary sport, but it doesn't need to be. Create your pack. Whether it's the tread, the bike, or anything else, find your people. Share on X

I’m so impressed. You guys have real metrics in here. You have a real structure in here. A lot of times, I hear about these things and they’re fun. Don’t get me wrong. I’m not trying to be negative toward anybody’s group. I love that people do all these things, but they don’t always have the fitness pillars underneath them. You guys do and I’m so impressed with that. That is so cool.

It’s so funny because it’s Felecia and me, and there are also three other admins and mods to the group, Audrey, Tiffany and Madinah. None of us is a certified coach. We all have a ton of experience in running and fitness. I don’t know how it happened. They all started calling us coaches. They’re like, “Coach Felecia said we have to do this. Coach Muriel said this.” I’m like, “We’re not coaches but okay.”

How can people become involved? Are there rules to who can join and who can’t join? You can’t talk about the Bike. We have covered that rule.

What if somebody talks about the Guide? Is that a loophole? Have you not written a rule for that yet?

As long as it’s part of the stack and it has a Tread workout associated with it, you can talk about it.

What else? What other rules are there? Can anybody join? A lot of times groups have like, “We want this. We’re looking for this kind of person.” What does that look like for you guys?

The group is for Black women. It’s for Black women who are interested in Peloton Tread workouts, and not just interested but are actively doing them. We try to discourage lurking. People know when I start getting a little annoyed because you’ll start seeing the hashtag all over for me that says, “Do the work, don’t lurk.”

It’s a workout, not a lurk-out.

A big part of it is that we’re a pack, and we’re here to support each other. Even if you don’t want to do the workout or you don’t want to post your stuff, just commenting on somebody else’s post is a way of doing the work and showing support to one another. That’s our main thing. We wanted to create a safe space for Black women who enjoy running and walking and happen to do so using the Peloton Tread workouts.

What if people outside of your group would love to meet up with you guys when you’re doing some of your outdoor events. Do you encourage that? Do you discourage that?

We’ve never been faced with that, but we try to keep it to the group. Even when we have meetups with each other, maybe I’m a little harsh but I’ll say, “This is for Tread Tribe members only. Please don’t bring your boo, your cousins, your uncles, your aunts, your nephews, your nieces, your best friend or your sister if they’re not a member of the Tread Tribe. We love them anyway, but this isn’t for them.”

You would think they would be bored.

I was thinking of other Peloton people. For example, let’s say you guys ended up at the Missouri Cowbell. I don’t know why you would be here, but if you did, could I say hi while you were there? I was going to think of that. I love Peloton.

If we have these meetups and say we’re meeting at a restaurant because we’ve reserved in advance or something like that. We try to keep our numbers and know who’s coming and how many. If you, your cousins, and your friends come and say, “I want to join you guys,” last minute, we’re like, “Sorry, Crystal.”

If I ever come, I’ll make sure and tell you way ahead of time.

I would love to meet up with you and say hi.

When we were in Kiawah for the half marathon, we took a group picture. You take the celebratory picture. They were Peloton people who saw us with our Peloton gear on. They were like, “Hi, Peloton. What group are you guys in? What crew are you in?” You give each other some depth.

You talked briefly about events you have coming up. Did you want to give people an idea or a little more in-depth of things that you guys are working on?

I’ll be honest with you. We are pretty happy with what we’re doing. We’re not looking to add a lot of things and grow into this enormous Tread Tribe universe. We like our little family. The main things that we focus on are the weekly workouts and the quarterly challenges. We do things spontaneously. When Jess Sims decided to do two 60-minute classes in one weekend, we did a spur-of-the-moment hall pass challenge. You didn’t need to do your June monthly fit test if you did both 60-minute classes live. People were like, “Decisions.” We have a lot of fun because we’re not too rigid. That allows room for spur-of-the-moment things to do and challenges to come up with which end up being a lot of fun.

Peloton gives us so many other options with the Guide, the kickboxing, and so much more. People tend to add those with their stacks or if they’re on different rides that they want to ride on. We don’t want to give them too much. We keep it running in the schedule and let them choose what they want.

We try not to be all things to all people. We know which part we’re doing and encourage other things. For example, a lot of our members, Felecia and I, included also do Power Zone with the Melanated Soul Crew. We will use both of those together to get a full-rounded workout. We’ll do the Melanated Soul Crew Power Zone challenges as well as the Tread Tribe schedule. Some people are doing Tread Tribe together with the hardcore schedule. You can mix and match rather than us trying to be like, “We’re going to take over your whole Peloton mind share.” We’ll stay in our lane, do what we know and what we like to do, and leave a ton of room for folks to do other stuff.

Especially the three days a week. There’s plenty of time to add in all the other things.

Do you guys have Tread or Tread+?

I have a Tread+.

Tread+ and I’m not giving it back

I don’t want to give mine back either. I do go back and forth on a daily basis. I’m like, “If the November date comes and goes and I still don’t know what’s happening with the new redesign Tread+, I’m nervous. Now I’m like, “Are they still going to honor a return? Are they still going to repair it?” There are all these questions I have about the Tread+.

I have questions because you guys are always in the know. Is there a new Tread+?

There is supposedly a redesigned Tread+. We know at this point that no one is going to see it until at least May of 2023. That’s why I’m nervous because November 2022 is our deadline all the way to May 2023. That’s a long time. It makes me anxious.

You have to do a cost-benefit analysis. I’m a big fan of pattern recognition. The benefit that the Tread+ has had on my knees is amazing. I used to be an outdoor pavement runner. I’m going to be 52 in 2022 and the body was not doing it. This has saved my knees. I can run on it. I only do outdoor runs once a week and am fully prepared for a race. That is amazing to me.

The second thing is pattern recognition. You look at what’s happened with the Bike+. The cost has slowly come down. If they are going to do something with the new Tread+ over time, my guess is the cost will come down, and then your warranty will be out anyway. You’ll want to replace it. It will be good. If they don’t, you’ll be right back where you started, which is your Tread+ won’t work anymore. You’ll have to get the regular Tread. Here’s the thing. The question is, “Are any classes ever going to bring back free mode?”

The regular Tread doesn’t have it.

They’re inclined to 12% which is only as high as it goes. Let us the free mode. They’re lucky it only goes up to 12%. They’re the privileged ones.

Honestly, the biggest thing about the Tread+ for me is the slats. I agree with you about the knees. That’s my big thing. Tom did bring up a good point about the space. I keep having this argument through my head. Maybe I should send it back, get the smaller Tread, and also get the rower. I don’t know that I want to because of the comfort level I have with the Tread+. It has been a workhorse since day one. Nothing has been wrong. Mine has been perfect. I love it so much.

It’s hard to go back.

I would also like to point out that when she went through her cost-benefit analysis, it was remarkably similar to things I had been saying. I’m just saying that I’m basically a Harvard graduate.

Felecia, what is your Leaderboard name so people can follow you?

My Leaderboard name is Run_Fit_Fee.

Muriel, what’s your Leaderboard name?

My Leaderboard name is Haitian Queen.

Tom, what else do you have for them?

Do you guys have any advice for people that are just getting started on their Treads? I don’t want any advice on the Bike.

I tell people all the time that Peloton has already incorporated programs within the Tread. People can start there, even for those that are walkers and say, “I’m not a runner. I don’t think I can ever run.” Some people are surprised at themselves once they finish those programs. I always recommend the programs to start off with for sure. The You Can Run Program is fantastic

Muriel, do you have anything to add?

One of the best things about Peloton, whether it’s the Tread, the Bike or anything else in the community. Find your people, even if it’s 3 or 1 person that you can say, “Let’s meet up at 5:00, 6:00,” or whatever on the Leaderboard and connect with folks. Felecia and I didn’t know each other, even though we probably ran at some of the same races in the past. I have met so many women like her who have become amazing friends. We have a shared passion around fitness that we take on Leaderboard, but also off of the Leaderboard. That’s great. That’s the main thing. Running can be a solitary sport, but it doesn’t need to be. Create your pack both on and off Leaderboard.

Thank you so much for taking time out of your day to join us. Before we let you go, remind everybody where they can find your tribe and where they can find you guys if you would like to be found.

Our tribe is on Facebook at BGM Tread Tribe. We’re also on Instagram. You can’t find me on Instagram hard. The only social media I’m on is LinkedIn which is sad. You can find me on LinkedIn under Muriel Wilkins.

Felecia?

We are on Facebook and we’re on Instagram, under the BGM Tread Tribe as well. I’m also on LinkedIn at Felecia White.

Did you want to plug your podcast real quick for people?

Thank you. My podcast is called Coaching Real Leaders. It’s done in partnership with Harvard Business Review. You can find it anywhere that you get your podcast, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or on the Harvard Business Review website.

Thank you so much for joining us. We appreciate it.

Thank you. You guys are a ton of fun.

—

I guess that brings this episode to a close. Until next time, where can people find you?

People can find me on Facebook at Facebook.com/crystaldokeefe. They can find me on Instagram, Twitter or anywhere on the Peloton leaderboard @ClipOutCrystal.

You can find me on Twitter @RogerQBert or Facebook at Facebook.com/tomokeefe. You can find the show online at Facebook.com/TheClipOut. While you’re there, like the page and join the group. Don’t forget our Patreon, Patreon.com/TheClipOut, where you can get bonus content and ad-free episodes. It’s a delight. Finally, check out our YouTube, YouTube.com/TheClipOut. While you’re there, don’t forget to follow us. That’s it for this one. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, keep pedaling and running.

 

Important Links

• Muriel Wilkins
• BGM Tread Tribe – Facebook
• Black Girl Magic Peloton Edition
• GO! St. Louis Marathon
• Missouri Cowbell
• Melanated Soul Crew
• Instagram – BGM Peloton Edition
• Muriel Wilkins – LinkedIn
• Felecia White – LinkeIn
• Coaching Real Leaders
• Apple Podcasts – Coaching Real Leaders podcast
• Spotify – Coaching Real Leaders podcast
• Harvard Business Review – Coaching Real Leaders podcast
• Apple Podcasts – The Clip Out
• Spotify – The Clip Out
• Google Podcasts – The Clip Out
• Patreon.com/TheClipOut
• Facebook.com/TheClipOut
• YouTube.com/TheClipOut
• Run, Lift and Live – Facebook group
• @RunLiftAndLive – Instagram
• @RunLiftAnd Live – TikTok
• RunLiftAndLive.com
• Facebook page – Run, Lift and Live
• The Big Business of Being a Peloton Instructor – Time Magazine article
• Ebony – Yoga Instructor Dr. Chelsea Jackson Roberts Modernizes the Ancient Practice With a Hip Hop Soundtrack
• NewsTodayHeadline.com – HEALTH: Peloton’s Cody Rigsby: Why Self-Care Is Essential During Pride Month
• Primal Kitchen – podcast episode with Cody Rigsby
• Speak
• TomsGuide.com – Peloton’s newest instructor is changing the fitness industry for the better
• Adam Shine Podcast – episode with Olivia Amato
• YouTube – Callie Gullickson
• Courtside Conversation with Ally Love
• Dr. Jenn Mann
• @DrJennMann – Instagram
• Hump Day With Dr. Jenn
• Fortune Magazine – 7 of the biggest ‘free agent’ C-suite leaders on the job market right now
• Seeking Alpha – Peloton Interactive: Do Not Test The Depth Of The River With Both Feet
• MetPro.co/tco
• Facebook.com/crystaldokeefe
• Instagram – Clip Out Crystal
• Twitter – Clip Out Crystal
• @RogerQBert – Twitter
• Facebook.com/tomokeefe

 

About Felecia White

Sr. Information Security Administratror at MedStar Health.

 

 

 

 

 

About Muriel Maignan Wilkins

Co-founder & Managing Partner of Paravis Partners (www.ParavisPartners.com), a boutique leadership development firm. Host of Coaching Real Leaders, a podcast in partnership with Harvard Business Review. CEO-advisor and executive coach with a strong track record of helping leaders develop in areas of executive presence, role transitions, and relationship management. Work with senior level clients across a number of industries including management consulting, private equity, biotech, and financial services through coaching, training and consulting. Co-author of the bestselling book “Own The Room: Discover Your Signature Voice to Master Your Leadership Presence” (HBR Press) and contributor to the HBR Guide to Coaching Employees.

 

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