Beating Summer Slumps: How to Keep Your Classes Full During Summer Months
By Megan Hottman

If your Spinning® participants are anything like mine, they prefer to ride outdoors during the summer months, which leads to a substantial decline in Spinning class attendance until the fall season. Here are some points that will bring those outdoor riders back indoors for Spinning class.

Spinning classes offer stress-free training. Summers can be a very busy time—the kids are home from school, we’re taking summer vacations, families often visit—a 40-minute Spinning class offers convenience and a controlled environment in which to do consistent, challenging and distraction-free training.

Remind your students that Spinning classes provide them with a worry-free environment. The road you desire is just a hand-turn away, with no traffic lights, cars or potholes, and the weather conditions indoors are always perfect. What you get is ideal, highly effective training without interruptions.

Spinning classes improve pedal stroke and form. Training indoors can actually make cyclists strong on the road. Spinner® bikes are chain-driven, fixed-gear bikes with a heavy flywheel, which allows riders to smooth out the pedal stroke and consistently improve form like few road workouts can.

Because the Spinning program provides both high-intensity workouts and active recovery with little stress to the joints, participants can experience a personalized ride every class. By focusing on specific training objectives during each class, your students can map out a training plan to maximize results.

Riders will stay cool and hydrated despite the weather. Temperatures are high in most places now. Here in Colorado, we have been in the ’90s for several weeks. In other areas like the Midwest and Deep South, where you have heat and humidity, it is much more difficult to stay adequately hydrated when training outdoors.

Spinning classes offer a temperature-controlled environment with easy, safe access to liquids; a rider can get a great workout without having to worry about heat effects. For your competitive athletes, maintaining proper hydration is even more critical to both the recovery and maintenance of their bodies.

Social network. Many Spinning students come to class for the social aspect of group exercise. They like to know their instructor and keep in touch with their friends from class. I like telling them about my racing adventures to keep them hooked, since summertime is the height of my road racing season. Often, they will come to class to find out about my most recent race or to ask their friends about how their lives are going.

Bribes. I bring in samples of various sports drinks or electrolyte products for my students to see whether it is something they would like to use out on the road. Often, just the promise of trying a new product might entice a hardcore outdoor rider in to my Spinning class—especially on a warm day.

Other times, in order to encourage participation, I will use bribes such as t-shirts, hats and other tangibles, most of which I receive from my racing sponsors (who love this kind of promotion, by the way). It doesn’t have to take a lot to pique the interest of your participants, and that t-shirt might sway them into coming indoors for class instead of riding outside.

We all know fall and winter are the most popular seasons for Spinning classes, but the summer can be just as successful if you really market the advantages of riding inside.