Climbing in the Pain Cave

I’ve been taking  a spin class every Wednesday evening at the Falconbridge O2 Fitness club.  The instructor’s name is Jason, and he is simply fantastic.   He makes each class feel like I’m racing in the Tour de France.  And when I am tired and want to slack off, he’ll say just the right things to motivate me to get back into the groove.   Here are some of the things he’ll yell out to the class:

Stay with me

How bad do you want it?

I know it hurts

You can do this.

Once after class, I told Jason how I liked it that he made the class feel like a race.  He said he used to race on UNC’s cycling team.  How cool is that?  It sure explains his racing slant toward leading the class. I love it.

We do a lot of climbing sets in the spin class.  This past weekend, I was riding my bike outdoors, and it felt really awkward to climb on the bike.  In spin class, I am on a rigid bike when doing the standing climbs, and my muscles have adapted to that.  But on a real bike, I do alot of rocking back and forth during a climb.  I asked Jason about this.  He told me that spin classes made him a much better climber.  He said that the rocking motion increases the surface area of the tire against the road, and wastes energy.  If you can keep your bike more straight and stable during a climb, you will climb faster!   I can’t wait to play with that theory.

I call Jason’s spin class “The Pain Cave”.  Sometimes I think of this video – one of my favorites as you may know – while I am spinning.

[youtube:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjWqNk5HYoA]

This is what he says:

In time trial, it’s just you and your bike and the road. You must forget about the love for yourself. You must be a masochist. I want more pain, more pain. Go, Go, Go, Go. When you like suffering – when you like the pain in your legs and all your body – it means you are good.