Spinning

Activio Bikes in the ToneZone

This will be short (I think) because I was busy tonight getting some documents together to import my personal belongings into Ireland. The documents are to show that I am moving between the two countries and don't have to pay duty. The freighter is supposed to arrive on April 7th. It'll be nice to have my things again.
Earlier this evening I went to the ToneZone at the National Aquatic Centre (NAC). I'm a member at the NAC so I can use their pool and gym. Part of the membership also includes classes such as the spinning class pictured above.
I've never been to a spinning class and thought I would try it out as part of my training for the Ironman this Summer.
Spinning is a room full of overweight, middle-aged people going really fast on stationary bikes; trying to keep up with a young, skinny instructor. What is different (I think) at the ToneZone is that everyone gets a heart rate strap around their chest and a computer displays everyone's heart rate zone as a colored dial on a big projection screen.
Your strap number is displayed, but who the person behind the strap is, is supposed to be anonymous. I think the idea is to compete, without embarrassing yourself.
Last week was the first time I went and the instructor did not pay much attention to the dials. He told us what to do and not to worry too much about the heart rate. It was a good workout and I felt faster riding my bike all week long after that. (Which is probably an illusion ;-)
I had a really hard time understanding the instructor. A bike is a "boik", but after that most of his instructions were lost in his accent and the loud music.
I had to watch the other people to see what he was telling us to do. The problem was that after each shouted set of instructions, each participant did something different. Some turned the resistance up, some down. Some went faster, some sat back down on their saddles and slowed down. And these were Irish people! Maybe it's an output-only language ;-)
This evening was different. The woman leading us was all into heart rate. She would tell us to go to 75% of our maximum individual heart rate, which we entered into the computer at the start of the session. When people went much above, she would ask who number 13 was, and tell them to take it easy. For slackers, she would again ask for them to identify themselves and go over and turn up the resistance dial on their bike.
She watched me for a while and then asked what I had entered for my maximum heart rate. She was not happy with my answer and increased it first by five and after a while by ten. In the meantime I was huffing and puffing, and there was a big puddle of sweat around my bike that hasn't moved at all.
Increasing my max heart rate lowered my percentage, so soon she would be back and increase the resistance on my bike again. Then turn around to the class and yell at everybody not to lower their resistance. I think that's what people have been doing when they thought she was not watching ;-)
The woman next to me was going "fock, fock, fock..." (more Irish for you ;-)
This instructor was easy to understand, because she is an immigrant with an eastern European accent and speaks more like the rest of us foreigners than the Irish. I'm used to people who say things like "move more far away", but I do have trouble with the natives. More on language in another post.