So… I got my shoe stuck in a bike at Spynergy cycling studio before Thanksgiving and actually had to abandon it there. Yeah.
How it happened: The SPG clip on the bottom of my shoe had gotten loose, and I was having trouble getting them to click into place at the beginning of class. (This is my least favorite part of cycling, actually, trying to get the shoes to click in, feeling like everyone’s watching me kick at the pedal like I’ve never been to spin class before.)
I was having so much trouble that I took the shoe off to look at it, and noticed one of the screws was actually missing. I figured it’d be fine if I just hand tightened the remaining screw and clipped in.
Everything was fine until after class, when I turned my foot sideways to snap out of the bike pedal and only the shoe turned, loosening the screw instead of pulling the clip out of the bike pedal. The screw wasn’t tight enough to hold the clip in a steady position on the shoe so that the shoe could rotate out of the bike pedal clip. Instead, the shoe itself rotated, loosening the screw, but the clip on the bottom of the shoe stayed straight in the bike pedal. The shoe wouldn’t rotate enough for me to unscrew it from the SPG clip by turning it around in circles, so it was good and stuck.
I had to introduce myself to the cycling instructor (whom I’d never met before because I don’t usually go on Tuesdays) and abandon the shoe in the bike.
Why Spynergy is awesome: Luckily, the cycling studio was amazing. They somehow managed to get it off the bike, and fixed my shoe for me. They even put in a replacement screw! How nice is that?! They stored my shoe behind the desk with a note on it to save it for when I came back after Thanksgiving.
I rushed into the cycling studio behind schedule this morning, checking in with a frantic “Caiazzo! Do you have my shoe?!?! THANKS!” much to the surprise of the women around me, who evidently aren’t in the habit of abandoning their shoes at Spynergy. (Maybe they should be, since a free tune up was involved!)
Check your screws: Moral of the story – check your SPG clips and make sure the screws are tight, especially if you feel like it takes you multiple tries to click into the bike pedals. I tightened my other shoe before leaving this morning, and instantly clicked into the pedals this morning. Not only was my difficulty clipping in probably loosening my screws, the looser my screws were, the harder it became to get the correct angle to click in.
I’m still enjoying going to a spin class about every week – my legs feel FANTASTIC as I write this. Don’t be scared to try it! Just keep your screws tightened if you use clip ins 🙂
Tracking my progress: I snapped a quick photo before I left of the screen read-outs (Spynergy got new bikes so now we can see wattage, rpms, mileage, etc.) I was able to enter that information into my Garmin Connect account, so I’ll be able to compare my indoor cycling sessions and create cycling goals. Some days, I’ll probably just want to go in and ride and have a good time. But it’ll be fun to track my improvements, and occasionally shoot for higher average wattage or a higher max wattage during a specific class. I often wish I’d had a Garmin on for my Couch to 5k training so I could look back and see what my pace was on those early, early runs! I don’t want to miss the chance to have this early spinning data to look back at later on.
Happy running, spinning, yoga-ing, chasing kids around the house and lifting large bags of groceries, or whatever other activity you’re into 🙂
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