Why You Should Celebrate Your Little Exercise Victories
Milestones are great, but they aren’t the only fitness goals worth honoring.
By Catherine Hopkinson•
Hitting a Peloton milestone, whether it’s class #1 or #1,000 (yes, you can join the comma club!), is always exciting. But there are lots of other moments in your Peloton fitness journey that deserve to be celebrated too. Maybe it’s making it through a longer class than you thought possible when you first got your Bike. Maybe it’s doing an overhead shoulder press with 15-pound dumbbells. Or maybe it’s, as Member Frank K. says, “Every time I get on it.” (Totally valid!) We asked Members to share their own mini milestones.
“I think it was because I finally stopped thinking about it.”
Whitney B. didn’t necessarily have a cycling goal in mind before she reached her own mini milestone. But she was frustrated by her inability to execute a specific cycling skill: running out of the saddle at moderate to heavy resistance. “I had a mental block that with a bum knee it wasn’t in the cards for me, so I’d let myself give up or stay in the saddle instead of trying. I’m that rider that Tunde has to yell at to get back up,” she says with a laugh.
That is, she was that rider. Then on a ride with Jess King, somehow, the magic happened. “I finally hit running cadence out of the saddle the entire time while hitting the resistance numbers,” she marvels. “It felt amazing!”
Whitney’s next official milestone is her first 60-day streak, and her ongoing goal is daily consistency. “I feel better mentally and physically after moving, so putting it on my plan each day to give myself that time is my biggest goal,” she says. “I’m not letting work, life and everything else keep me from taking care of myself again.”
“I felt so powerful and accomplished.”
Megan E. is a dedicated all-around Peloton athlete: She became a “full-blown running fanatic” thanks to the app. She hits the Bike two or three times a week in addition to half-marathon training, and she picks up weights five times a week. But she struggled with one particular exercise in those strength classes: renegade rows.
The full-body fav that targets the back, core and arms is hard for her because she has bad grip strength coupled with wrist issues. After lots of practice, she says, “I finally was able to get through a set of renegade rows a couple of weeks ago in one of Jess Sims’ Bike Bootcamps without having to be on my knees and with what I felt was proper form. My hips weren’t swaying side to side, and I felt strong the entire time,” she recalls. “It made me think about where I was when I first started with Peloton and where I am now, and I just felt kind of invincible.”
For her next mini milestone (outside of that half-marathon!), Megan is looking hard at the single-leg deadlift—without kickstanding her foot. “I get frustrated that my form is bad, and I’m not getting the workout I want when I try them. But I do a lot of the Strength for Runners classes, and they’re helping a lot!” she says, adding that putting in the work regularly is crucial. “I have a really good workout regimen going that has helped me get stronger over the last 9 or 10 months. Consistency is key!”
“I’ve never been a runner.”
If we had a nickel for every time we heard a runner say they’re not a runner, well, we’d need a bigger piggy bank. Melissa L. is one of those runners. She avoided the discipline until she and her husband brought the Peloton Tread into their lives, and she began to incorporate some walk and run classes into her fitness routine.
She didn’t really have any goals, she says, but then one day she was in a class with Adrian Williams. “I just kept trying to slowly increase my speed. I hit 6.0, which I’d never done before. It may be the low speed for some, but that was a big win for me,” she says. “I didn’t hold it for long, but he inspired me to keep trying to do a little better.”
What’s next on the milestone hit list? “I'd like to try to run an entire class. Right now I still have to stop and walk because I haven’t built that endurance yet,” Melissa says. “But I know I have the right tools to do it, and of course, I have these amazing instructors to provide encouragement!”
“I am so proud.”
Unlike the other Members here, Erin F. set and reached her fitness goal very intentionally. After getting her Bike and getting into a groove of riding two to four times per week, she says, “I wanted to do a challenge to sort of ‘reset’ and get into a better schedule of incorporating other classes. I decided that I would challenge myself to do yoga every day for a month. I felt this was measurable and attainable for me.” Smart thinking, as specific and attainable goals have the best chance of being achieved.
But that wasn’t all: “I have never been able to touch my toes, so I thought that would be a good thing to track throughout the month. I felt yoga would increase my flexibility and push me to stretch after my rides—something I didn’t do previously,” she explains. “I am so proud to say that I completed my goal, and I can now touch my toes!”
Erin also credits her regular Peloton yoga practice with unexpectedly eliminating her tendonitis flare-ups and giving her increased range of motion on the Bike—and she’s not quitting yoga any time soon.