The old spin can’t come to the phone right now…

Why? Cos she's dead!

This past Saturday I got very little sleep. Embarrassingly, I spent hours in the middle of the night, in a TikTok hole wondering if I’ll ever be able to make the kind of snappy and amusing little videos other spin instructors do. To top off this deeply uncomfortable experience, when I finally managed to drag myself up and out of my TT hole, I found myself reading some industry “insights” along the lines of, “spin is dead” and, not for the first time this year, I began to wonder whether there is any other modality I could see myself enjoying/learning/teaching. A classic, anxiety ridden night of “what-ifs”!

I’ve spent so much of the past several months since launching my own spin biz, thinking, and talking, about this thing I love so deeply. It’s impossible to overstate the impact spin has had on my own life. The gift it has been. This year alone, it has given me the ability to completely transform my working life. I’ve left my “sensible”, traditional but soul crushing job in law, something I never could have seen myself doing even this time last year, to give “kind of full-time spin biz person” a go. I’ve also taken on a side hustle as a barista (so grateful for this new job) to support myself because the money I’m currently making from spin simply isn’t enough to cover housing costs and bills.

Spin has been a huge part of how I’ve moved my body for the past 12 years. In recent years it’s where I’ve made every single new friend and the community I’ve built from the podium, has held me as I’ve explored my identity which has shifted, expanded, and bloomed, in the 4 years since I taught my first class. It’s so hard to believe now (especially for me!) but I was dating a straight, cis man when I first started teaching.

Since my very first time in the saddle, spin has been the biggest source of joyful movement in my life. For the first 3 or 4 years it was part of a much bigger schedule of gruelling, daily workouts. During my intense running years, I “treated” myself to one spin class per week and I looked forward to it every day. I loved those weekly rides and I craved more of them, frustrated my very precise marathon training plan wouldn’t accommodate cross training more than once per week. There was something about that dark room, the way it completely immersed me in the music and the deliciously satisfying feeling that came from moving my body to a beat, that I simply couldn’t get elsewhere in my training plan/workouts. I was hooked.

When I started to explore the concept of joyful movement around 2016, something I was drawn to in the aftermath of a painful break-up and the difficult realisation that I had been subjected to years of particularly nasty body shaming and emotional abuse by my ex-partner, I started to approach every workout by asking myself the question, “am I enjoying this?” I stopped any workouts which elicited a “no” answer. It wasn’t long before spin was the only form of group exercise I was participating in.

As a spin teacher my priority has always been to create a joyful space for folks to come and move their bodies. A space free of shame, judgement, or expectation. I work hard to keep diet culture and any/all body hierarchies out of my spin-room, and I centre queer folks, bodies, and experiences. These are non-negotiables for me and my biz.

It has become clear to me, particularly over recent months, that what I have created in my class is an expression of my inner teen. I’ve had the privilege of creating a space, and a community, that my teenage self would have absolutely adored on so many levels. As a queer person this is especially important. Whilst we are in the middle of a lesbian renaissance in pop music (YAY!), this visibility and the pop cultural celebration of queer joy, is a very recent development. Back when I was an actual teen in the early 00s, growing up in a small town in northern England, I don’t think I could have named a single gay girl in music. And, back when I trained to be a spin teacher only 4 years ago, I didn’t know any lesbian/non-binary instructors.

My time in dark sweaty rooms, on bikes on either side of the podium, has given me the gift of freedom and joy in my body, heart, and mind. Riding has developed power in my physical body whilst also giving me a place to sit with the hardest symptoms of my mental illness. I genuinely believe that I would not be the person I am today without spin. So, the morning after my anxiety riddled night, I dragged my exhausted ass off the couch (where I had sat doom-scrolling so as not to disturb the rest of my gorgeous little family) and made my way to Gymbox Farringdon to teach a Charli XCX x Kesha themed ride.

When I’m feeling particularly anxious, I remind myself to take class one track at a time and I focus intensely on everything I personally love about each track which usually gives me plenty to talk about, as well as plenty to feel in my body. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. On this occasion I started to feel better in the first few seconds of class. I felt the spin magic. I shared it with the folks in the room. Once again, I felt immensely grateful for this thing I love so much.

At the end of the ride, I felt safe and supported enough to share one of the biz goals we’ve set for Ash Rides Ldn, to have double figures in terms of numbers in each ride. Since launching, I’ve felt unsure as to whether to share the nuts and bolts of what’s going on behind the scenes of the biz, I think because I feel so vulnerable about my spin baby. What if I tell the world I’m aiming to have 10 riders in every class and then I fail? What if sharing this goal suggests I care deeply about numbers from an ego perspective rather than a business reality? For the avoidance of doubt, I passionately believe that numbers are not an accurate indicator of a teacher’s talent or worthiness. What if folks who used to ride or work with me at my old studio - where I regularly had rooms full of 40 riders - hear about this goal and they judge me?

Until recent months I’ve always shared, from the podium and from my phone before and after class, with honesty and vulnerability. These have been priorities and necessities for me right from the start of my journey as a teacher. But lately, I’ve struggled to know what to share, particularly given that I am now very much more reliant on the income I make from spin to pay for my basic needs. What if I share about the 10 riders per class goal and classes get even quieter because folks think there will be no vibe? The “what-ifs” are relentless and so noisy there are times (often) when I simply can’t think straight.

On Sunday I decided, in the moment, that I wanted to acknowledge the 10 riders goal, and take a moment to vocalise my gratitude. When we arrived to set up for class on Sunday we had 8 bookings. On the Friday evening, we had 6 and I’d said to Lou that I had no idea how we could possibly reach 10 by Sunday morning, working on past booking patterns. And then, for the first time ever(!), 2 extra folks turned up at the ride and asked to buy a ticket there and then (THANK YOU LINDSAY AND SARAH!!) Lou was on front of house duties and, when she came into the studio from signing folks in, she was beaming and came rushing over to tell me about the extra folks who’d arrived to bring our numbers up to 10. Truly a nudge from a higher power telling me to trust and believe in myself and our biz goals. And so serendipitous it feels like it would be a missed opportunity not to share with y’all.

As for whether it’s time to add more movement strings to my bow, it’s pretty clear nothing is as personal to me as spin. In my view, a highly developed personal practice is essential to being a great movement teacher. I’ve wondered often about teaching some form of rest practice - something I’m continually developing a personal practice in - and I do think this could be a good option for me. Watch this space, I guess. On spin being “dead”, I’m wondering if that’s why we can’t get the old her on the phone? And I’m moving forward in the knowledge that my bike-based joy will sustain me and my biz regardless of fads or trends. Because me and spin, we’re in this for the fucking long game!