Top 14 Indoor Cycling Benefits That You Should Know
The bicycle was first introduced as a means of transportation in the 19th century. While it is still used as a primary means of transportation in many countries in the world. However, here in the US, it is being used more as a piece of exercise equipment. One of the primary reasons is because more and more people are discovering the health benefits of using a bike as part of their exercise regime. That has lead to a whole new offshoot of this activity that is done indoors; indoor cycling at home.
The indoor cycling benefits are exactly the same as outdoor cycling, but you don’t have to worry about most of the pitfalls. Indoor cycling has shown to have a long list of health benefits to everyone, regardless of whether you are a beginner, intermediate, or advanced rider. The indoor cycling bike or spin bike, however, you want to refer to it offers a number of exercise cycle benefits that anyone can use.
Adding one of the best indoor cycling bikes to your home gym would be very beneficial for a number of reasons including all of the benefits of cycling at the gym has to offer. Most people probably realize that indoor cycling provides both cardio cycle benefits, but not many would think that it also offers indoor cycling for weight loss benefits as well.
Indoor Cycling provides all of the same benefits of a spin bike workout since the workouts are virtually the same. As you will find out later in the article, that the only true difference between the two workouts is the equipment itself. This often leads people to believe that they are interchangeable.
Many of the local fitness centers near you will likely have some type of spinning classes or indoor cycling program. These classes work in conjunction with cycling machine gym equipment to offer one of the best overall cardio workouts. As part of this article, we are including a list of many of the spinning bike exercise benefits that you can get from adding one to your home gym.
1. Help with weight loss
One of the big keys to losing weight is by burning more calories than you consume in a day. One of the by-products of indoor cycling workouts is the burning of calories. So, by adding a session on an Indoor Cycling Bike to your daily exercise routine, you can add an extra amount of calories burned. You can get a good lower body workout and burn up to 80 calories per 10-minute riding session.
2. Improves your overall heart health
A good cardiovascular workout is the best way to energize your heart to pump more oxygenated blood throughout your body. A bike cycling exercise is a great way to get your heart rate to increase which helps your heart muscle to get stronger. So adding a 30-minute Indoor Cycling session to your daily routine will help your heart to get stronger in order to keep up with your body’s oxygen needs.
3. Helps to build lower-body strength
The muscles in your lower body will get a really good workout from cycling indoors. Your quads, glutes, and gastrocnemius muscles in your lower body and legs are heavily activated during a fully Indoor Cycling exercise routine. Muscle growth is one of the many advantages of a cycling machine in your home gym. By using the resistance control on the indoor cycle you can increase the benefits of indoor cycling exercise on your lower body.
4. Helps to decrease your risk of diabetes
Onset Type 2 Diabetes is thought to be strongly linked to obesity in adults. If you are at a greater risk of pre-diabetes or diabetes than losing weight is one way to reduce your risk. By adding cycling in home to your workout routine you can easily begin losing some of the extra pounds, which can make a huge difference in your overall health.
5. Improves joint movement
If you are someone who is having joint issues in your knees, ankles, and hips, adding a low-impact exercise like riding a spin bike can be extremely beneficial. The pedaling motion of riding an indoor cycling bike can help to improve the full range of motion of all joints of your lower body, this includes your hips, knees, and ankles.
6. Helps with brain function
One of the reasons that cycling at home is better than cycling outdoors is mental benefits of it. Using indoor cycling stationary with an Indoor Cycling is believed to have a positive effect on cognitive brain function. By the release of certain hormones during your workout session it is thought that it improves memory and attention. The pedaling motion of the Spin Bike is what triggers the hormone release in the bloodstream.
7. Lower stress level
According to several major studies exercise can help reduce the amount of stress you may be feeling by triggering your body to release good hormones. By releasing these hormones during your workout you are left with an amazing feeling when you are finished with your riding session. One of the hormones that are released during exercise is called serotonin, which helps to regulate your bodies mood.
8. Improves balance
Improved balance is one of the more interesting of the benefits of indoor cycling. By consistently riding a spin bike you can easily improve your overall balance and control. It also can help you improve your coordination and gait that will also help to increase your self-confidence. It also has been recommended to the elderly and some people who have suffered from a stroke and help prevent falls which often result in terrible fractures.
9. Boosts your endurance
One of the many cycling as exercise benefits also includes increased endurance. Improved endurance can be felt in many different facets of your life including your career and several other ways. The stationary bike is a very important tool that can be used to help you build up your endurance since it is something that you to be gradually worked on.
10. Provides a low-impact workout
The fact that an Indoor Cycling Bike provides one of the best low-impact workouts is likely the most under-appreciated of all the benefits of stationary bike routine. While there is a wide range of available cardio exercises, there are not many that are as low-impact as riding a Spin Bike.
11. Helps to tone the lower-body muscles
The ability to increase and decrease the resistance of your Indoor Cycling Bike makes the indoor bike for weight loss and for muscle toning a perfect fit. The more you continue to ride the indoor stationary bike, the more you will notice that your hamstrings, quads, glutes, and calf muscles are becoming much more toned.
12. It is a convenient home exercise
Being able to have a home cycling exercise is a definite advantage over having to ride outdoors or even having to go to a local fitness center in order to get the benefits of a cardiovascular workout. It would be much more convenient to have your own Indoor Cycling Bike in your own home gym, that way you can jump on it and ride any time you want.
13. Improves sleeping quality
Quality of sleep has been linked to overall health condition according to several long term studies. One of the primary reasons is that serotonin levels in the brain greatly affect good, restful sleep and maintaining a good fitness level including riding an indoor cycling bike regularly can help you maintain a healthy fitness level.
14. Improves sexual performance
Two of the most potent hormones that can cause issues in sexual performance is the stress hormones cortisol and adrenaline can have a negative impact on sexual performance. However, indoor cycling can help you keep these hormones at bay. One of the most powerful ways it can do that is by triggering your body’s endocannabinoids system into action. By reducing the levels of cortisol and adrenaline you reduce the amount of stress you feel energizing the sexual arousal in return.
Most Frequently Asked Questions About Indoor Cycling Exercise
There are so many things that everyone should know about the benefits of exercise bike workouts. The more you know about it before you make a decision whether or not it is a good fit for you the better off you are. We put together some typical questions that people have when they first start looking into home cycling exercise.
For those people who are looking for a way to add the benefits of spinning bikes to their in-home workout gym, you can easily incorporate an Indoor Cycling machine to get the benefits of riding a bike for exercise. While you would likely be able to find one or more local fitness centers that offer Spinning® classes, however, they may not always be convenient for you.
These classes are usually held at specific times and consist of many people all participating at the same time. They will usually fill a room with a large number of Spinning® Bikes and you have an instructor or two who are positioned in the front of the class. The good part of doing your cycling at-home is that you get more one on one focus.
You will also have options depending on your choice of Indoor Cycling equipment you choose there might be additional choices for a training system that would work in concert with your specific machine. Another good feature of having your cycling regime at home is that you can work at your own pace if you need to start out a bit slower.
The simple answer to this question is “no”, you don’t need to hire an indoor cycling instructor in order to get started. You can easily get started and see the indoor cycling exercise benefits without an instructor. One of the reasons why this possible is because many of the manufacturers of the Indoor Cycling equipment include features on their machines that make it easy to use them.
One of these may include a built-in display console that allows it to connect to the Internet and using an app you can find numerous workout routines. There are also services online that offer much of the same training classes including onscreen instructors. This means you never have to leave your home to get the indoor cycling bike health benefits.
Even if the model of Indoor Cycling Bike does not include a built-in console display you can use one of the many free mobile apps that can be downloaded to your tablet or smartphone and you can use it in conjunction with your home cycling exercise to get all of the health benefits that a Spin Bike class would give you at your local fitness center. By downloading the app to your mobile device and sign up for the membership depending on the app of your choice and get started.
The short and simple answer to this question is actually simple, everyone. Going by the extensive list of all of the benefits that we have discussed previously, there really isn’t anyone who would not to some degree benefit for all of the things Indoor cycling has to offer. Since we have discussed them in length previously it is not really necessary to rehash the cycling exercise benefits.
Now, we will mention that there are some very good reasons why some people look into this type of workout. It is considered extremely low-impact, which means it would be a logical choice for people who have diagnosed issues with their knee, hip, and ankle joints. Most other forms of cardiovascular exercises can be really hard on joints like; running, and aerobics, Indoor Cycling exercises are also extremely beneficial to beginners, intermediate and advanced level riders. Whether you are looking to get started, or you have been riding for a long time, Indoor Cycling is a really good option to choose for those times that you cannot get outside and ride your outdoor bike.
Home cycling exercise on a stationary bike is a great way to get a beneficial cardiovascular and lower body workout at the same time. Indoor cycling is perfect for those people who do not live near any place where they can ride safely. Fortunately, there are so many options available when it comes to buying the best Indoor Cycling Bike for your family’s needs.
Yes, according to several different studies an indoor cycling workout makes it possible to lose weight. During the study period (12 weeks in duration) participants rode a stationary bike for 45 minutes per session three times a day. Each participant was able to lose a varying amount of weight and body fat. It is believed that depending on the intensity of your workout and your bodyweight you can burn as much as 600 calories an hour.
So, if you combine an Indoor Cycling routine with a lower calorie diet, you should be able to lose weight. The key is to burn more calories than you consume in a day. So, there is a good correlation between indoor cycling and weight loss. The higher the intensity and longer duration that you ride will likely result in a higher amount of weight loss. There are many other riding routines that are designed to help maximize the burning of calories which in turn helps to promote weight loss.
A good example of a routine that helps to get your heart rate up to the necessary rate to promote weight loss is to follow this sample riding plan: Start off with low intensity pedaling for 10 minutes, Up the intensity to medium pedaling for another 10 minutes, Up it to high intensity for 2 minutes, Drop down to low intensity again for 2 minutes, Back up to high intensity for another 2 minutes, Back down to the low intensity again for another 2 minutes, Back up to high intensity for another 2 minutes, Cool down with a final low intensity for 5-10 minutes.
The amount of actual calories that are burnt during an Indoor Cycling session is highly dependent on a number of factors. According to everything we have read in preparation for this article is that a person could burn up to 600 calories per 60-minutes of indoor cycling work. However, in the same article, it does say that the precise amount of indoor cycling calories burned will depend on a number of factors.
The two biggest factors that are used to determine the number of calories a person can burn while riding a stationary bike depends on two factors; workout intensity and body weight. The higher you push the intensity (very light, light, moderate, vigorous, very vigorous) the more calories you can burn per hour of workout.
The other leading factor in the number of calories you burn is your overall body weight. The more you weigh the higher the number of calories burned and the increased intensity multiplies that amount exponentially. At 205 lb. you can burn anywhere from 279 calories burned, all the way up to an amazing 1163 calories burned.
The answer to this question is not really cut and dry and it depends on who you ask. When Spinning was first developed back in the 90s by Johnny G and Johnny Baudhuin and started a company called Madd Dogg. They are best known for creating the Spinning® Bike and companion Spinning® class.
They believe in the superiority of their machine and companion workout that they developed to bring the best part of outdoor cycling indoors. Both the exercise bike and workout routines are precisely engineered to maximize the results. Madd Dogg is the only company authorized to manufacture the Spinning® Bike and only Madd Dogg authorized gyms and fitness centers can use the name Spinning® class.
Now, when you compare it to indoor cycling it will depend heavily on whether or not you decide to use one of the many indoor cycling apps that are available. These apps are designed to closely replicate what you would find in fitness center classes or Spinning® class.
According to everything that we have read the Keiser M3i Indoor Cycling Bike is the highest-rated. While you may think a question like which one is the best spin bike might be subjective, however, when you put them up against each other using the exact same criteria it is easier to determine.
Just so that we are clear, the Keiser M3 is actually an indoor cycling bike and not a spinning bike since there is only one manufacturer of Spinning® Bike. Keiser poured all of the engineering experience and high-quality craftsmanship into all of the M3 models that they make. They will put their indoor cycling machine up against any all comers and it would appear that many in the fitness industry would agree with them.
The Keiser M3i includes many high tech features that you won’t find on any outdoor bike, but they are designed to help replicate the outdoor riding experience. Some of these features include an onboard computer with a display that tracks all of the important riding data. It also includes an exclusive advanced resistance system that makes it possible to increase and reduce resistance. This along with all of the other features that make it the top indoor cycling bike.
There is only one actual manufacturer of Spinning® Bike (it is trademarked) and that is a company called Madd Dogg. The founder and owner of Madd Dogg created the bike back in the early 80s and remains the only manufacturer. However, there are a number of other companies that have come up with spin bikes for indoor gyms.
The most well known of these manufacturers have to be Peloton. Their high-end spin/indoor cycling bike will set your bank account back quite a bit ($2000-plus), but it is packed with features that bring the best of any spin class offered at a local fitness center.
Another reason why Peloton is considered the best is that they also include a full-featured training system that works in conjunction with the built-in monitor. The Peloton system requires you to sign up for a monthly membership to have access to the professional trainer-led classes.
This is not an easy question to answer because it depends on the type of workout you are looking for. If you are comparing strictly on weight loss, then the treadmill is best hands down. However, if you are talking about a cardio workout, then the cycling gym machine is the better option without a doubt.
Another reason why a spin bike workout is better than a treadmill is that the spin bike delivers a much lower impact exercise. This makes it far more comfortable on all of your joints of the lower body including the ankles, knees, and hips.
The spin bike gives you a lot better overall workout if you have the time. However, you cannot beat the treadmill for delivering a much more varied workout a lot quicker.
While there are many different makes and models spin bikes on the market to choose from, they are only half the story. The other side and equally as important these days are getting the right app to put it all together. The app delivers an immersive experience that no piece of exercise equipment can deliver and it helps to amplify the results of each and every training session.
Depending on the app and the specific piece of equipment you can bring the best of what a spinning studio has to offer right in your own home gym. There is one slight downside, some of the apps come at a cost. Fortunately, not all of them actually do cost you money. The Top 5 Best Spin Bike Apps includes some free and some not so free options.
Top 5 Best Spin Bike App: Peloton – requires a monthly membership fee of $13 per month. Variis – has a monthly membership fee of $40 per month. Aarmy – is totally free and available on Instagram Live. Lost Cycle – Also available on Instagram Live and it totally free. CycleBar Go – Has a $20 per month membership charge.
While the Stages Solo is not the most affordable of all the spin bikes on the market, it does have a whole lot of perks that can make it well worth the price if you can afford it. All of the features and comforts that are packed into a cycling gym machine definitely sets it apart from any of the other models on the market.
Now, if money is the limiting factor, then the Keiser M3i would be a very strong second. However, with the Keiser M3, you would need to have a tablet or smartphone to get an experience like Peloton from one of the apps. The M3 series indoor cycling bike is a professional level indoor exercise bike that is also designed to be used at home.
It is capable of delivering all the indoor cycling exercise benefits that you would expect from an exercise bike in a fitness center. There are actually several models that are part of the Keiser M3 Series of Indoor Cycling Bikes. Each of them has a number of beneficial features.
Many people use terms Spinning® and indoor cycling as they are interchangeable, but the truth is there is a difference. Stationary or indoor bikes have been around for many years and they are designed to work nearly exactly as an outdoor bike does. A Spinning® Bike has a unique feature that is built into the pedaling system.
Spinning® Bike was created back in the early 80s to better replicate the ride of a road bike. The primary difference between the two types of bikes is that the Spinning® Bike has built-in gearing that allows you to spot pedaling without causing the bike to stop.
The free-spinning wheels are a huge advantage over the traditional design of an Indoor Cycling Bike that does not have it. There are some other smaller details but many of the Indoor Cycling Bikes offer many of them including smaller saddles, fully adjustable handlebars, and seat posts.
Conclusion
People have been riding bikes for transportation and recreation for centuries and now people are discovering that there is one more way that riding a bike can be beneficial; to your health. According to several studies, cycling provides weight loss and cardiovascular benefits. Unfortunately, not everyone has access to places where they can ride a bike near them.
Fortunately, there is a solution, an indoor cycling bike which provides you with indoor cycling benefits without having to leave your house. By adding indoor cycling workouts to your weekly exercise routine you will get both a weight loss benefit and cardiovascular benefit from only using one extra piece of equipment.
Indoor cycling has become a really popular added feature with many of today’s fitness centers. Most of today’s gyms and fitness clubs offer Spinning® classes that feature Spinning® Bikes. However, many of these classes are included in certain membership plans and that means you have to pay extra.
To help people who don’t want to go to a fitness center to get the spinning bike exercise benefits you can purchase one of the top indoor cycling bikes for your home gym. By adding one of the many different models of indoor cycling bikes like the top-rated indoor bike the Keiser M3 Series or the Stages SC Series deliver a professional level indoor cycling exercise session.
Having an indoor cycling bike in your home gym will give you the desired results that are equal to those spin bike weight loss benefits you would get from a Spinning® class at your local fitness club. Whether you are looking to lose some excess weight or add some heart-healthy cardiovascular workout to your routine, you can get either or both by adding an indoor cycling bike.
Sayed Hosseiny
Hi there, I'm Sayed Hamed Hosseiny, the founder and one of the authors at yourexercisebike.com (YEB). I am a former indoor cycling instructor and personal trainer with nearly 20 years of experience. With a passion for indoor cycling, I have spent years designing cycling parts, repairing, and importing exercise bikes. All the articles, tips, guides, reviews, and comparisons on YourExerciseBike.com (YEB) reflect my personal opinion and expertise in the field. I'm excited to share my knowledge with fellow exercise bike enthusiasts and help people find reliable indoor cycling information and the best exercise bike for their needs.
