Friday, December 22, 2006

Product Review: Spinervals Autumn Country Training Ride

I was pretty excited to find that Coach Troy has a new video series called Virtual Reality. The first (and so far only) video is Autumn Country Training Ride. I put it on my Christmas wish list, and my husband presented it to me yesterday (ahem- NOT Christmas) with that romantic phrase so dear to female hearts, “Here. I didn’t feel like wrapping it.”

Easygoing bunny that I am, I saw the forest for the trees and was thrilled to have a new spin video, no matter what the date or method of delivery. And today I tried it out.

Let me start by saying that riding through the Maryland countryside with Coach Troy is fun. Watching the scenery made the time go by fast. I was disappointed, though, that we didn’t do more climbing. Instead we spent a lot of time in small gears at a high cadence, which made it a tough workout for me. And unlike other Spinervals workouts, there were no rest breaks. Oh, Coach Troy would suggest slowing down at stop signs, but there weren’t a lot of those, and we only slowed enough to make the corner before Troy was off again, urging us poor fools at home to stay on his wheel.

So it was, for all intents and purposes, 50 minutes without a break. And also unlike other Spinervals videos, this one went right up to the 50 minute limit. The cool down was afterwards and not included in the stated workout time.

It was a good workout, and quite a departure from Coach Troy’s other stuff. If you like his other videos, you might enjoy mixing it up with this one. And if you don’t care for the other Spinverval workouts, where there’s nothing to see but a bunch of other cyclists suffering, this ride through the autumn countryside might just be the right one for you.

I’m looking forward to seeing more in the Spinervals Virtual Reality series!

Recent Workouts
Monday: 45 minute elliptical
Tuesday: 45 minute spin
Wednesday: rest
Thursday: 30 minute elliptical, 15 minute stairmaster
Today: 50 minute spin (Spinervals 1.0 Autumn Country Training Ride)

2 comments:

Herself, the GeekGirl said...

Cool! I'll have to check this out. I've got his easy intervals one, and have enjoyed that very much. Treadmill running can be so BORING. Thanks for the review!

Una said...

Fabulous! I have a couple of spinnervals (yes the sit in class ones) that I haven't viewed yet (need to still set up that bike trainer!). I think I'll check out this one though, it sounds much more interesting!