PART 4

USING THE TABLET

PELO TIP 18: GETTING TO KNOW THE TABLET

As I hope I’ve made clear by this juncture, the touch screen tablet on your bike is a pretty sophisticated piece of equipment. While you’re enjoying riding your Peloton Bike, the tablet is collecting data and accessing and analyzing that information. By getting to know your tablet, you can make sure that you get the most out of this powerful tool and make it work for you.

For starters, let me say that you shouldn’t be afraid to tap around on your tablet; it is pretty hard to mess it up. Explore it however you see fit.

Let me take you through my own experience with the tablet. My wife and I keep our bike in sleep mode. It’s programmed to automatically go into that mode after five minutes of inactivity. When I tap twice on the tablet screen, the first thing I see is the “Choose Profile” page, containing icons for each user in our household. I tap once on my username and get to the home page. In the upper right I’ll see a box notifying me of an upcoming live ride that I can join. Below that will be a number of recommended on-demand classes, challenges, and programs. There is certainly no shortage of choices.

Then, on the bar at the bottom of the screen, from left to right you’ll see the following:

• Your personal page: this contains an overview of your personal stats, calendar, workout history, achievements, graphs highlighting your activities, and music you might have saved during rides.

•Your home page.

•Programs that group different classes by theme, instructor, music, fitness level, and mood.

When it comes to programs—especially if you’re new to Peloton—I would advise starting with the “Welcome to Peloton Cycling” series. This is a collection of eighteen beginner classes, each running for about twenty minutes. These offer an excellent way to get comfortable with cycling on a Peloton and also introduce you to different instructors (whom you may like so much that you’ll seek out their other classes).

On your tablet display, just to the right of programs, you will find classes. These classes are intuitively organized by instructor, length, music genre, class type, subtitles, and weights.

Meanwhile, over on the schedule tab, you’ll see that you can make appointments for upcoming live classes you’d like to attend. Peloton will even send you a reminder of upcoming classes at your email address.

The next tab you’ll see contains active challenges that are coming up, if you are feeling especially goal-oriented.

Whenever you tap the “More” tab, you are given two choices:

“Just Ride,” which is the place to go to do your own thing and record your metrics.

The other choice will be “Scenic Rides,” which gives you a choice to ride all over the world on country roads, city streets, off-road mountain bike simulation, or a combination thereof.

Personally, I love to vary my days. For example, one day I will take a live or on-demand class with one of the instructors I like, and on the alternate days I will do a scenic ride. This way it never gets boring for me. I hope you’ll find you have the same experience!

Your tablet’s screen also functions in an interactive way. To the right you’ll see a “Message Center” that has recommendations from fellow Peloton travelers.

The final tab—all the way to the right on the bottom of the tablet screen—is a menu that takes you to a master menu of functions that includes:

• Instructors

•Peloton Members

•Facebook Friends

•Profile Settings

•Device Settings

•Peloton 101

•Get Help

•About

•Log Out

Then, on the upper right of your screen you’ll see the Wi-Fi strength indicator, a clock set to your local time, and settings. To make changes here, tap on settings, and a drop-down menu will allow you to change Wi-Fi settings, brightness, volume, cast screen, Bluetooth audio, heart rate monitor, and device settings.

I hope that the depth and breadth of functions is inspiring, not intimidating. I gave the example of a car earlier, and I think it applies here again. You don’t need to know every function on the dashboard in order to drive the car, and you don’t need to master every function available on your Peloton in order to have a great riding experience. I encourage you to do what my wife and I did: explore it at your own pace. Don’t try to learn everything on the first day. Instead, accept that it will be a gradual and unique journey to getting the most out of your bike.

PELO TIP 19: THE LEADERBOARD

So, whether you are taking a class or going on a scenic ride, you’re going to see all sorts of numbers when you ride your Peloton. At the bottom of your screen will be three numbers with which you will become very familiar over the course of owning your Peloton Bike:

• To the left, you’ll see Cadence, which is the speed at which you are pedaling.

•To the right, you’ll see Resistance. This is controlled by the orange knob underneath the handlebars. If you turn the knob to the left, you will feel less pressure, and the pedaling will become easier. When you turn it to the right, the pedaling will get tougher—just as if you were cycling up a hill. The Resistance number on the screen will go higher the more you turn the knob to the right.

•Finally, the omnipresent number at the center of your screen will show your Output. This number is calculated using the combination of your Cadence and Resistance. In my opinion, this represents the “Holy Grail” of Peloton because it’s a good indicator of how much effort you have put in on your ride. Your total Output is shown in kilojoules (kj), which is another way of saying one thousand joules. A joule is one-watt in one second. So, for example, one joule of energy can light a one watt light bulb for one second. That might not sound like much, but when you add it all up, the energy you burn can be quite astounding!

Unless it’s your thing, I wouldn’t get hung up on complex calculations. Suffice to say, your effort is measured by how hard you’re working during a ride and for how long you’ve been working.

One quirk: Sometimes the Output on the bottom is off from the Output shown on the Leaderboard. Don’t worry! That’s only because it takes longer for the system to update the metrics on the Leaderboard.

In addition, if you have a heart monitor, those metrics will also appear on the left side of the screen.

The Leaderboard is where the rubber hits the road. It’s here where you can make your ride competitive—if you like—and see how you measure up against real people. (For folks who are not competitive, or find this intimidating or annoying, you can easily swipe it away with a right finger movement on the screen.)

I think engaging with the Leaderboard can be more fun if you understand what the numbers mean.

The first thing you will want to do is find your username. Let’s assume you have never taken a ride and therefore have no Personal Record (PR) for this type of class or scenic ride. That’s okay! The status bar not only shows your username, but the number to the left will show your position on the ride. At the top of the Leaderboard, you’ll see that you have two choices: “All Time” and “Here Now.”

If you tap on All Time, your position number will display where you are relative to everyone who has ever taken that ride. If you tap on Here Now, you’ll see what your position is against people presently riding. You will also notice a “Filter” button. With this choice, you can literally filter it down to certain people you are following; this means you can tell how you’re doing compared to just those people.

When you start riding, you should see a circle around your avatar. This is actually a clock. It becomes shaded to indicate how much time has elapsed. This is so, when you compare yourself to others on the same ride, you can tell if they started before you did.

Below your username you’ll see information about you including your sex, your age, and your location label. This information is collected from your Peloton profile. You can choose to show or hide this information, as you like, through your Peloton preferences.

To the right on the Leaderboard is your Output number, which corresponds to the Output number that displayed on the bottom of the screen between Cadence and Resistance. The Output number determines your rank on the leaderboard.

If you have previously taken a similar ride, the leaderboard will also show your Personal Record (PR) either above the main status bar, or right below it. If, for instance, you took a twenty-minute beginner class, it will show your personal record in parentheses next to the type of class you took. It will also give you, to the far right, a pacing number indicating what you did in the class in which you achieved your Personal Record. In this way, you can compare that best with how you’re doing in the ride you’re currently on. If you are not keeping up to the pace of your PR, this information will go on top of your status bar. If you are doing better at this point in the ride, it will go below the status bar.

It takes some time to see how this all plays out when you are comparing yourself to others on the ride, especially if you didn’t start at the same time. But I think you’ll find—once you get into it a little bit—that it can be galvanizing and fun to compare yourself to others, and/or to try to match or exceed your personal best.

PELO TIP 20: SO, WHAT’S FTP?

In the next section of this book, I’ll introduce you to something called Power Zone Training. But before you can use Power Zones, you will need to assess what you are capable of in a twenty-minute ride. This is referred to as your twenty-minute average. By testing yourself in a twenty-minute period of time, you will be able to calculate your FTP. Confused yet? Wondering why this is a good thing? Stay with me.

Before you take this twenty-minute test, I highly recommend that you do some really good stretch exercises, easily found on the Peloton App. Then you should hop on the bike and do something called the “10 Min FTP Warm Up Ride.” To find this class, tap on “Programs” on the bottom tool bar of your screen. Under training programs, tap “Discover Your Power Zones.” In that grouping you will find the “10 Min FTP Warm Up Ride.”

So enough suspense. What’s FTP?

FTP stands for Functional Threshold Power. The warm-up ride I’m recommending here prepares you for the intensity of finding what your personal threshold is. So, psych yourself up for an intense half hour where you will push yourself to the limit. Directly after completing the warm-up, go back to the “Programs” tab on the bottom tool bar. Once again, tap “Discover Your Power Zones.” There you will see the “20 Minute Test Ride.” Now tap that and follow the instructions from your leader. As always, make sure you are hydrated and have a towel at the ready!

At the end of your ride, your twenty-minute average FTP output will be displayed on your ride recap. Your FTP will be important as you move into Power Zone Training.

PELO TIP 21: POWER ZONES

Now to Power Zones! Power Zone training is aimed at challenging you to improve your strength and endurance. There are seven Power Zones presented on a continuum from “Very Easy” to “Max Effort.” Each Power Zone represents a target output range customized for each rider. In my household, my seven zones are different from my wife’s, and our sons all have different zones based on their individual outputs. During a Power Zone Ride, you will hear your instructor call out a specific Zone, which you will then endeavor to achieve. Other riders on the Leaderboard will be at their own Output levels, but you and they will be in the same Zones. See the difference? The purpose of the zone system is to see if you can improve over time, by competing against others but keeping your progress customized to you.

To use Power Zones, you will first need to figure out your average output during a twenty-minute ride. Once you have that average, you can calculate your FTP and, from there, figure out your target output for each of the seven zones.

Don’t worry! It sounds more complicated than it is. Here are the steps that Peloton recommends:

1. Take the “10 Min FTP Warm Up Ride,” which, as stated above, is found in the “Power Zone Program.”

2.Immediately afterward, complete a “20 Min FTP Test Ride,” also in the “Power Zone Program.”

3.When you complete your ride, seek your twenty-minute average on the ride recap screen.

To learn more, go to your home screen and tap on the three dots in the lower right-hand corner. On the pop-up menu, tap “Profile Settings.” Then, under “Preferences,” scroll down until you find “Display Power Zones” and tap on it. Under “Power Zones FTP,” choose “Custom Value.” There you will see a pop-up keyboard. Now enter your best average output over twenty minutes to set your Functional Threshold Power (FTP). And when you’re finished, tap “OK.”

The good news is that you don’t have to do the math. The bike’s computer does all of that for you. And once you’ve taken these steps, Power Zones will show up on your display for every ride. If you like, you can take the “20 Min FTP Test” ride at a later date to see if your twenty-minute average output has increased. You can then enter the new numbers to update your output ranges.

On all successive rides, you will see a bar below your metrics. It lights up in different colors as your output goes up and down. The colors correspond to your power ranges and target output ranges.

To review, these are the seven Power Zones:

Zone 1 Very Easy	<55% of FTP Characterized as warm-up or recovery
Zone 2 Moderate	56-75% of FTP Characterized as a comfortable, long ride
Zone 3 Sustainable	76-90% of FTP Should be sustainable for over an hour
Zone 4 Challenging	91-105% of FTP Sustainable for up to an hour
Zone 5 Hard	106-120% of FTP Sustainable for 10–15 minutes at most
Zone 6 Very Hard	121-150% of FTP Sustainable for 30 seconds to 3–5 min. max.
Zone 7 Max Effort	>151% of FTP Sustainable for only a few seconds

PELO TIP 22: CUSTOM AUDIO

Let’s face it: some days you’ll need the encouragement of an instructor to help you get through the ride, but other times you want something else, like music, perhaps. But what are riders to do if they prefer a musical accompaniment to their workout?

In the spring of 2019, Peloton made an effort to address this situation in many of their on-demand classes and allow for a musical option. Now, let me be clear from the outset: Peloton’s solution is still far from perfect. However, it is a first step in allowing you some control when it comes to determining which audio element has the higher volume: the instructor or the soundtrack.

How do you adjust the volume-to-instructor ratio? The answer is NOT by using the on-screen volume control. Instead, you’ll need to press the volume buttons on the right side of the back of the tablet.

When you do this, a pop-up menu will appear on your screen. (You might need to keep your finger on the volume control because it quickly disappears.) This pop-up menu displays three choices from left to right: more music, original mix, and more instructor. Above these boxes, you will find a volume bar; slide it right to increase the volume of that audio element, and left to decrease it.

To be clear, these volume controls do not give you the ability to eliminate either the instructor or music completely, but you can still go a long way toward emphasizing the one you want to hear. Further, this feature works with both the built-in speakers and headphones. And if you change your mind about the audio mix and want to reset things, simply tap the volume buttons again until your mix is recalibrated.

Probably the number one question people ask at this point is “What about my music?”

Well, if the music Peloton plays is not to your liking—and you’d prefer to pedal to something else entirely—there’s a solution, albeit an imperfect one.

If you want to listen to your own music, slide the volume bar all the way to the left and play your personal music on a Bluetooth device. Obviously, you won’t hear the instructor in this scenario, but you will still have the visual cues on the screen to guide you toward reaching the desired metrics for your ride. For many riders who want to hear their own custom playlist during their workout, this trade-off is more than worth it.

Personally, I go along with the musical choices that the instructors choose. Using Peloton’s built-in filters, I have some choice of music genre or even particular artists and decades. I also like that I can change the ratio of music during the on-demand rides by pressing volume control on the back of the touch screen.

But there’s one genre of music where I put my foot down—and not in a good way! I just can’t stand the cheesy electronic music that accompanies the scenic rides. It’s so off-putting, and in my opinion it seems utterly incompatible with the video element when you’re riding the streets of Paris or traveling down a country road in New England.

So before I start a scenic ride, my solution is to go to the upper right-hand corner of the touch screen and tap “Settings.” Then I scroll down the menu until I see volume. I slide the bar all the way to the left, which essentially makes it mute. Then I go to the music library on my phone, find a nice playlist I’ve created for the ride, and synch it to a Bluetooth speaker in my workout room. Then I get on the bike and enjoy the high-quality music playing from the speaker, which is a more appropriate playlist for my workout. It’s total bliss!

PELO TIP 23: CLOSED CAPTIONS

Studies have been done on the effects of subtitles in movies on an audience. These studies reveal a variety of responses. While some find it distracting to see subtitles, others find that they understand the dialogue, characters, and story arc much better when they can read the lines being spoken.

Everybody’s brain works differently, and I imagine it is no different when you are watching an instructor in an exercise class.

Personally, I like doing the workouts with the closed captions on, using my tablet or phone. (Not so much on the bike, when it competes with other metrics that are showing up on the touch screen.) The reason I like it for the off-the-bike workouts is because the speakers on my phone and iPad are not ideal, and when the balance of music to voice is off, closed captioning helps me to see something I might have missed via the audio. This is especially helpful during a complicated exercise during which I need to concentrate (and/or when the tablet or phone is not necessarily as close as the touch screen on the bike).

To turn the closed caption function on, tap on a class that you want to take. A box will pop up that gives you a preview of the class you are about to take, including the rating, level of difficulty, the equipment you will need, the music that will be featured by artist and track, and the class plan. There is also a brief description of the class. Directly below that description is the “Closed Caption” box. Tap on it to indicate you want to have subtitles and then tap the red “Start” tab. As soon as the instructor starts talking, you should be able to see the closed captions. When you are finished with the workout, remember to go back in and tap the closed caption box again to turn it off for the next time (so that it doesn’t remain on when you next use your bike).

PELO TIP 24: TARGET METRICS

One of the neat things about Peloton is that no two instructors or classes are exactly the same. You can use this uniqueness to customize your own workouts as you move closer and closer toward meeting your fitness goals. However, for some riders, the sheer variety of choices available can be daunting. For example, sometimes you know which types of training goals you want to achieve, but you don’t know which class(es) will help you get there. The good news is that Peloton offers significant help when it comes to determining which classes are right for you. Many on-demand rides allow you to preview the scope of Resistance and Cadence that will be featured in that particular ride. You access this information by selecting a class and tapping it once. You will then see the preview pane. In this pane, you can scroll down to see the metrics (and even music) that will be in that ride. This preview can allow you to determine beforehand if a ride’s target metrics are going to be in sync with what you’re shooting for.

Another word about target metrics: Once you start a ride, you may occasionally space out and fail to hear what an instructor just said about increasing or decreasing the Resistance or Cadence. (Goodness knows, it’s happened to me a number of times!) But if this happens, don’t worry! Peloton has you covered. Ranges will be displayed on the screen directly above the resistance, output, and cadence you are currently achieving. If you miss a verbal adjustment from the instructor, you’re bound to see it reflected here, as well.

PELO TIP 25: ON THE CHEAP

I’ve struggled with where to put this tip—or if I should even include it—but I think it’s vital to speak to this issue somewhere because it’s relevant to so many riders and potential riders.

Let’s just say you don’t want to invest the two thousand-plus dollars for the Peloton Bike or commit to the first-year subscription of forty dollars per month. What are your options? Well, what some people have done is to find a way to simulate the experience. For example, you could get a decent spin bike for around three hundred dollars. Some of these even come with the essential resistance knob. Then you could subscribe to the Peloton App for a price of twenty dollars per month, something the company offers for people who don’t own the Peloton Bike. You get the same terrific classes, but just not on a fancy Peloton Touch Screen. You would want to get a tablet or phone holder that is attached to the handlebars of your spin bike. And you would also want to get a separate cadence monitor. If you have a smart TV in the room where you’re riding, you could even cast the particular class onto the bigger screen.

Obviously, this solution isn’t the same as purchasing a real Peloton Bike. However, because Peloton offers the app in anticipation that many people are going to do this, I don’t think anyone ought to feel it qualifies as “cheating.” For example, some people might be considering making the purchase of a Peloton Bike, but before they do, they want to ensure that it’s the kind of exercise they will enjoy and stick with. (This might be someone who has never ridden any kind of exercise bike before.) For these folks, I think that using the app can be a great way of gauging their own response to a bike before making a big purchase. And for folks who simply aren’t going to have the true Peloton Bike within their budget for the foreseeable future, this method can be an acceptable long-term work-around.

PELO TIP 26: JAILBREAKING

Jailbreaking is another controversial topic. In the interest of full disclosure, I should note that I have not done this, but many Peloton users have. Rather than watching the workout videos, live classes, and scenic rides with prerecorded music (for the monthly fee that Peloton charges), some users have taken to jailbreaking their Pelotons. This involves hacking into the Peloton and using it to view whatever content you like, free from the Peloton subscription service.

The company warns explicitly against doing this, and it will certainly take your tablet out of warranty. Nonetheless, many Peloton jailbreakers are rooting the Android-based tablet in order to access apps like Netflix and Spotify during their rides.

If you’re a self-styled hacker and this type of thing appeals to you, there are instructions available on the Internet showing you how to do it. But please let me be very clear: you do so at your own peril. Your bike is a big investment. When you take it out of warranty, you are putting that investment at risk.

Personally, jailbreaking is just not my thing. I’m here for the full workout experience. But I won’t judge you if you feel you would be most satisfied by using your Peloton in a different way.