#MondayMotivation: Home Fitness, Reimagined

How many commercials do you sit through on a given weekend of television viewing? Too many. How many of those commercials are advertising beer, food, cars or other television programming? Most of them. How many of those commercials actually motivate you to get up off your couch and want to go to the gym? Just one.

Peloton is a cutting-edge indoor bike company that has transitioned from having a cult-like following, to main stream audience thanks to a simple 60-second television spot. I’ve been told the story of the mother waking up, tip toeing past her family, getting on her Peloton bike, attacking the hill, crushing the flats, pushing boundaries, changing her life; dozens of times.

Each time, I get a little more intrigued. Surrounded by those beer, food, car and programming ads, she introduced herself again yesterday and I started doing some research. Peloton isn’t just indoor cycling, it’s reimagined for the home. “Lauren”, we’ll call her “Lauren”, can wake up, tip toe down the hallway, get on her bike but this isn’t just any standard fitness machine though.

Peloton bikes offer live and on-demand classes, world-class instructors, an easy-to-use, interactive touchscreen that puts you in the center of each class and tracks dozens of measurable components, including cadence, calories burned, distance ridden, power output and much more.

“Peloton has a much bigger picture approach,” said NY Times bestseller and Forbes columnist Larry Olmsted. He goes on to add, “It merges gym quality equipment with expert instruction, uniquely effective motivation, data and metrics and more classes, teachers and options than any brick and mortar facility could dream of offering.”

Peloton have also caught the eye of outlets such as Sports Illustrated, USA Today and Good Housekeeping. Their bikes have also been seen in the background of Connor McGregor Instagram photos and Ayesha Curry is “obsessed”. Building on the critical acclaim, Men’s Health more or less summed it up last year when they said, “Peloton is the best cardio machine on the planet.”

So, how do you lock in and start riding? There are twenty Peloton showrooms across the country, from New York to Palo Alto, a booming subscription product and standalone iPhone app for those that already have a indoor spin bike of their own. According to Fortune, the company expected to make over $150 million in revenue in 2016. While their financials and sale numbers from last year have yet to be revealed, Peloton are already one of the industry leaders and are competing, pedal for pedal, with Equinox’s gym chain product, SoulCycle.

By definition, a “peloton” is the main field of cyclists in a race. Ironically, if Peloton continues to reimagine home workouts, continues to create a cutting edge fitness experience and “Lauren” continues to motivate, Peloton may just leave the rest of the home workout field chasing them to the finish line.