SoulCycle
Classes
Spinning Spin-Offs
Yesterday we reported that SoulCycle was expanding its offerings with SoulDance, a class designed to "ignite your inner SEXY SOUL! ...[with] everything from basic ballet to simmering chair routines." Unclear whether or not those simmering chair routines would be performed on a bike seat... But today we got another email from SoulCycle, this one introducing "Soul Pilates," and this one made it very clear: "This class is taught entirely OFF the bike." So it's really just Pilates, taught at SoulCycle, which I guess is what makes it "Soul Pilates." Which makes you wonder, when a spin studio starts offering lots of different fitness classes, does it just become a gym, but more expensive? Or is this just a nice way to give spinners some cross training? Debate and discuss. (I think it might be Option A, but maybe that's just me being mean).
New York
Classes
SoulDance May or May Not Involve SoulCycles
This just landed in our inbox from SoulCycle:
"Good Morning SoulCyclists, Are you ready to get your groove on??? Join Janet Fitzgerald for her first ever 6 week SoulDance Camp !!! This is extraordinary dance class will challenge you in ways you have never experienced, working EVERY muscle in the body with exhilarating movements that will ignite your inner SEXY SOUL! Class will cover everything from basic ballet to simmering chair routines that you can take home with you....HAWT! Come experience 90 minutes of raw passion, awesome music, sweat, and lots of laughs!"
Questions abound. Is that sexy chair dancing on a bike seat or just a regular chair? Will the Clintons be there? Should you like answers to these and other questions, email sarah.fincke@soul-cycle.com.
New York
Events
Chelsea and Bill Spin For $100K
How much do people love spinning? Or maybe the better question is, how much do people who love spinning love the Clintons? So much that Soul Cycle's hour long ride with Bill and Chelsea this weekend raised more than a $100,000 for the Clinton Foundation Haiti Fund. Very nice. And also intriguing. I've developed a theory: I think it has something to do with spandex. Spandex is not a conservative fabric. The more spandex you wear, the more liberal you are. Spinning and its full body spandex...you do the math.
New York
Openings
SoulCycle's Manifest Destiny
This just in: SoulCyle opening two new Manhattan studios. Details fuzzy on precise addresses, but still-warm press release says "Upper East Side" and "Union Square." This brings the total SoulCycle empire to seven locations, and 11 celebrities willing to have their name in the press release...
Brooke Shields, Kelly Ripa, Anderson Cooper, Jeff Probst, Kyra Sedgwick, Edie Falco, Katie Lee, Chelsea Clinton, Tory Burch, Kevin Bacon and Jane Krakowski are just a few of the familiar faces in the studio.
What's all the fuss?
More...Spin Wars
SoulCylce Defector Launches New Spin Studio with Tiki Barber
Spin junkies alert: There's a new kid on the block. Ruth Zukerman, onetime SoulCycle star, is set to open Flywheel Sports this February. We hear SoulCycle dumped Zukerman when they caught wind of her plans, and now there's a schism in spin-land: "Katie Couric and film producer Jane Rosenthal will go with Zukerman, but the fate of other regulars, like Brooke Shields, Kyra Sedgwick and Chelsea Clinton, remains up in the air," reports The Post. Our sources say Zukerman is the bomb. "She puts Christie Brinkley in the normal category," one reader emails. "50, and a health/role model for women."
More...New York
Scandalous
Honey, I've Fallen in Love with My Spinning Teacher
And now it's all over Page Six....
As the music begins to pound, a hard-bodied, platinum-haired instructor Stacey Griffith, 41, is commanding full attention. "I can take you places you've never been before," Stacey says, stoking the group to pick up the peddling speed. "Let me help you to detach," she coaches. "Go to your sexiest place!"
Apparently Stacey helped Debby, Bridgehampton mother of three, detach entirely from her rich Wall Street hubby, and now Stacey and Debby are the talk of the Upper East Side. Or at least of the Upper East Side SoulCycle. Debby "rides on the instructor's bike, while Stacey beams with pride, shouting encouragement while pacing the floor." It's more proof that the vibe is thick at SoulCycle, home of the affluent, and perhaps a little restless. Look, we sympathize. Spin class can get pretty intense, but fair warning to Tribeca husbands: SoulCyle open its new "temple" on Warren Street next Friday.
New York
Openings
SoulCycle Opens "Temple" in Tribeca
SoulCycle, heretofore, a strictly uptown and Hamptons phenomenon is heading downtown. Recall that SoulCycle, beloved by Kelly Ripa (if not Anderson Cooper), is affluent New York's soulful answer to spinning. According to an email that hit our inbox this morning, SoulCycle will open a new studio on Warren Street in Tribeca on January 15th. In addition to a traditional 65 bike spin studio, the SoulCylers are introducing a "Soul Lab," a.k.a. "an intimate 30-bike studio with mats in between the bikes to facilitate our BRAND NEW ONE-HOUR SOUL CLASSES!" What's a "Soul Class?" Think 30 mintues of spinning followed by 30 minutes of powerflow yoga, or 45 minutes of spinning followed by 15 minutes of ab work.
Actually, it sounds pretty good, though admittedly there might be a limit to how deep one can get into savasana while lying at the foot of a spin cycle in a puddle of sweat. Regardless, the real news here is that Tribeca is fast becoming the epicenter of the global fiterati. Residents of Warren Street can now spin at SoulCycle and do yoga up the street at the Kula Yoga Project. Or they might just stroll around the corner to Equinox's Tribeca outpust, or hike eight blocks north to work out with Gwyneth at Tracy Anderson's new (and strangely un-buzzy) studio. Move over Malibu.
i wholeheartedly agree with charity, fatbottomslim(hey chica!!) and ..." More comments...