143: Homecoming Sells Out in 9-Minutes! Plus our Interview with Nicole O'Mara

143: Homecoming Sells Out in 9-Minutes! Plus our Interview with Nicole O’Mara

Last Updated: January 18, 2023By Crystal OKeefe (#ClipOutCrystal)Tags: Fitness Community, Peloton Bike, Peloton Community, Peloton Enthusiasts, Peloton Trainers, Peloton tread

There’s a lot of hype around the online sphere for the Peloton Bike, but there’s a new movement gathering around the Peloton Tread.

After all, some people enjoy their bike workouts, but others do need a good run.

Nicole O’Mara is one such Peloton enthusiast who’s mostly made the switch to the Tread.

Nicole shares her experience of making the switch with Crystal and Tom O’Keefe.

Could the Peloton Tread be more your speed?

Find out now!

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Watch the episode here:

Listen to the podcast here:

Homecoming Sells Out in 9-Minutes! Plus our Interview with Nicole O’Mara

The sickness is setting in.

I don’t feel good. I think it has arrived. I blame you.

You should. I had it. I still have the cough.

I over did it signing up for homecoming. That’s what the final straw was.

Not to give too much details, but I lost three-and-a-half pounds. That is not hyperbole. Low carb bulimia is not advisable, but it is effective. Hopefully, you don’t get that end of things.

I hope not.

I also learned a very valuable lesson about when and when not to sneeze. Let’s leave it at that. What do you have in store for people?

We are going to talk about Peloton, shocking. We’re going to talk about homecoming. We’ve got lots to talk about. We have an interesting article from Motley Fool Investing. We’re going to talk about an instructor that’s no longer with Peloton. We have a visit from the Peloton Prophet, then all kinds of little detailed information about things that are happening.

Before we get to all that, shameless plugs, don’t forget, we’re available at Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play, wherever you get your podcasts, you can find us. While you’re there, be sure and subscribe so you never miss an episode. Of course, you can find us on Facebook, Facebook.com/theclipout. While you’re there, like the page, join the group. You’ll get all sorts of things like handy tips about how to get your homecoming tickets. We had people saying that we were the reason they got their tickets. They were like, “Thank you, Crystal, for the tips. I have tickets now and it’s all because of you.” That’s what they said. That’s another valuable service that we offer. Of course, you can feel free to leave us a review there in Apple Podcasts or Facebook, wherever. We have a new review. It’s from iLisa1983. She says, “Peloton Prophet FTW. I only had my bike for about six weeks and binge-listened to all the episodes because I was so pumped. I especially love the Peloton Prophet and getting insider information. Keep up the good work.”

To be clear, the Peloton Prophet does not work for Peloton, so it is not technically insider information.

We like to put that disclaimer on there, so Peloton doesn’t think we’ve infiltrated the company. That’s all of that. Let’s dig in.

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I can’t tell you how relieved I am that we got homecoming tickets today. I can’t even imagine what this household would have looked like had we not managed to secure at least one ticket. I would stand out on the sidewalk and wait patiently for you. By patiently, I mean at the comedy cellar. It would not have been good. We don’t mean to rub it in the face for people who maybe tried and didn’t get tickets, but I’m just saying it would’ve been ugly.

I was ready to go. I had three computers. I had my phone. I’ve talked about my coworker before who’s my boss who gives me a lot of crap for a lot of things, including how slow I am. He slow-shames. He speed-shamed me. I got to work and he was there and I was like, “This is not good a day for him to be here. Today’s a big day for me, you can mess with me all you want after I have the tickets, but until I have the tickets, you need to leave me alone. From 11:00 to 11:15, do not talk to me.” It’s 11:00 to 11:15 because we’re Central time. They went on sale at noon Eastern. He came over and stood next to me while I was typing in the credit card information and he was like, “What are you doing?” I was like, “Stop it. I will tell you in 30 seconds when this goes through.” Then it went through and I was like, “We can all breathe now, people.”

I feel confident that the people were breathing the whole time. I got it too.

I’m so grateful you did because the first time, mine didn’t go through. It was like, “We had an error. Could you do that again?” I was like, “No,” so I did again and it went through that time. It was all good.

Last year 2019, it’s all out in twelve minutes. This year in nine minutes.

I actually don’t know how many minutes it was last year. Last year 2019, the difference is that they had Saturday packages and Sunday packages and there were all kinds of confusion. Saturday sold out fast. Sunday never sold out. If it sold out in twelve minutes last year, that was only for Saturday. This year it sold out in nine minutes for the whole shebang.

It was when people are upset because they didn’t get to pick there. The thing is even if you did get to pick, you probably wouldn’t have gotten to pick.

I get that people want to be in a class with somebody. They probably need to figure that out. They need to say like, “I want to take a class with this person,” and add a box to be able to do that. Then you’d link each other, but it’s so hard. I think that it went beautifully compared to 2019. It was perfect compared to 2019. Last year 2019, it didn’t even happen on the first day.

The site didn’t crash, they didn’t have to refund a bunch of tickets and have everybody start over. It was a market improvement over the last year 2019.

And I know that it sold out really fast, but there are 750,000 subscribers to Peloton and there are 3,000 tickets. You can see that coming.

Unless they figure out a way to accommodate more people. This is not going to get better anytime soon. At least I hope it’s not. If it gets easier to get tickets, it means nobody’s interested anymore.

It’s tough because a lot of people are like, “I don’t want to deal with it on Peloton. I don’t want to deal with homecoming weekend. I want to go on my own. I’ve been whatever.” I get that. For us, we have to go. I mean that I want to go. We can’t go to New York two or three times a year, so this is it. I want to see as many people as possible. I love it.

Hopefully, you got your tickets. If not, if you’re wait-listed, hopefully someone has a change of plans.

For those of you wait-listed, there’s a lot of you that have a very good chance of getting in because you can refund up until for one. The schedules come out on March 9th, so whatever classes you picked, “I have these five bike instructors, I have these three tread instructors,” so let’s say that people get their schedules on March 9th and they’re not happy with it, so now they’re not going. They’re going to be asking for a refund. That means you on the wait list move up in line. I do think that’s going to help.

A lot of people that can go to New York frequently that live close or travel a lot for work, if they don’t get the classes they want, I think you will see them bailing, and those wait-list people will move in.

It happened in 2019.

Keep your fingers crossed. Don’t lose hope.

Another date you need to know is February 24th. You can make changes on your preferences for the instructors you chose up until February 24th. Log in and make your changes. That’s February 24th, schedules come out on March 9th, refund until April 1st.

I thought it was interesting that someone posted on our page that people in the UK, they were wanting to buy tickets and they were struggling because it made you enter a zip code and they don’t have zip codes. Over there, they call them postal codes.

It wouldn’t accept foreign zip codes. They only accepted US zip codes.

I thought it was great that apparently some people that lived over there, they only knew one zip code and it was 90210.

There are a lot of people coming from 90210. That made my day. That was so funny.

If you see lots of people with British accents, but with large sideburns, it’s because of 90210.

I think this is going to be great. Did you want to talk about anything that’s coming up for homecoming? You talked about you wanted to go through the site and talk about all the stuff. Now you look like you have no idea what I’m talking about.

I was like, “You should go through the site.” Were there any highlights that you saw that you thought people should know about?

Things are different from last year 2019. One thing I’ve learned about Peloton is they change things every year. They don’t do the same thing twice, which I appreciate. Last year 2019, everybody was ticked off that there were a limited amount of spots for the community run. This year 2020, no limit. Everybody was invited. Friday, 3:00 PM, everybody can join the community run. That means that it doesn’t count as one of your classes, which I don’t think it did last year 2019 either. You still get a studio class. This year, another thing that’s different is you don’t get to pick your studio class because last year 2019, you had the stress twice. You had the stress of buying the ticket. Then once you had the ticket, you had to go and pick your instructor. That was insanity. That was a knockdown drag-out fight and everybody ended up pissed off about it.

You get one class, and for those of you who are new to this whole realm, not everybody’s going to get a Bike class. There are 3,000 people coming. There’s no way to fit 3,000 people on the bikes in one weekend. We think there are only 70 Bikes, so you can’t. The math isn’t there. That means, some of you are going to be on Treads, some of you are going to be on Bikes, some of you are going to be in Yoga. You’ve got to pick from two and then you say, “I would like these instructors,” and you pick from five on the Bike, you pick from three on the Tread. All of that was different from last year 2019. In March 9th, you’re going to get handed an instructor. That’s all different.

That instructor is yours to keep. Do you get to take them home?

No, Tom. Another thing is they have said that there is a community celebration, but we don’t know. Is it Friday night or is it Saturday night? We don’t know anything yet. We do know it’s at a place called Terminal Five and it’s a giant ballroom. It seats 3,000 people. The look of the place tells me we’re going to have another musical guest, but I don’t know if that’s the case. That is purely speculation on my part. I’m very curious to see.

It’s a concert venue. I think it very much stands to reason that there will be some musical guests attached.

Also it’s in Hell’s Kitchen. That would be the first time I’ve been in Hell’s Kitchen. Not that it matters. I just like saying that. There are two hotels that they recommended. There was the EVEN and then there’s the Crowne Plaza. I have heard that the rooms are all booked at the Even already. In Crowne Plaza, last I heard they’re still available. “Can you transfer an event package to another member?” No, you can’t. Don’t even try. They’re not going to let you. It’s not happening.

I can’t scalp mine on the secondary market?

You cannot. Also another question I have heard a lot, “Can I still attend the warehouse sale?” No, you can’t. It says, “Only if you have a package.” They stuck with it last year 2019. They were like, “No.” There are a lot of people who are like, “I live in the city but I’m not going to the homecoming, so I want to come hang out with you.” No, you can’t. We can always meet up with people, but they can’t come to these things. It’s not a thing. It’s going to be a great time. I know there are some of you that are nervous like, “I don’t know if I’m going to like all these people.” You will because there’s a ton of first-time people that come, you will recognize people.

I feel like as it gets bigger, you’re getting more first-time people coming. A lot of people are like, “I liked it better when it was smaller.” The people that had been doing it every year are starting to be like, “No, thank you.” Because of that, more first-timers can come. It’s at least based on chatter online, that was my takeaway.

When someone tells you they ran a marathon, you can't help but be in awe of those people. Click To Tweet

I think that you will have a good time. You’re only going to get one studio workout, but you could come Thursday if you wanted or you could stay an extra day, obviously if your schedule budget allows.

If you do, that’s something to consider.

The other thing I will tell you is last year 2019, on Sunday it was really dead. There might be some things that you want to do that you didn’t think you should stay for. It was slow in the open space where they had all the instructors compared to Saturday. I don’t know what it’ll look like this year because the schedule is not out, but keep that in mind. People seem to be focused on the Saturday activities. Also, everyone stays up late the night of the celebration. There’s a lot of drinking. A lot of people don’t make it to their classes Sunday morning.

Do you have any anecdotal evidence that would back up this theory?

Make sure that if you want to take classes, show up on those mornings because they usually have a waitlist right there that you can hop in.

Odds will be very good on the Sunday. I think you’re three for three now, right?

No, I did my classes last year 2019.

Didn’t you have a Sunday class blew off last year 2019?

I don’t think so because I only had one and I took yours. All the years are starting to mingle.

Anyway, there’s a whole bunch of information for you and more tips and things to look for and whatnot. We talked about the stock price and the quarterly earnings reports.

I was so pumped after that earnings call.

We were so wrong, which is another good example of why you should not come to this show for investment advice. We do not know what we’re talking about. Motley Fool, an investing website and I believe podcast, had an interesting article about why the stock decline after that quarterly earnings report was dumb.

Literally, the title is Why Investors Overreacted on the Peloton Q2 Earnings. They overreacted for sure. We talked about in the last episode, I’m not going to recap all of that. I felt like it was great and I explained to you about the difference between last year versus this year and how it meant that there were 6,000 orders they pulled in the second quarter, which meant they lowered their quarter earnings, like estimates. Apparently, that was the panic button issue because they lowered third quarter so, “It must be terrible.” I feel like, “If you had gone to the earnings call, maybe you would have understood that.”

That’s the problem with the stock market. They’re basically trying to incentivize them to not deliver the Bikes as quickly as possible so they would land in a different fiscal quarter. That’s dumb and short-sighted. Thank you, Peloton, for not doing something dumb.

This article covers that. They covered how it’s going to make this year compared to last year. It’s going to be tough because if you’re looking at Q3 compared to Q3, that’s not going to be apples to apples anymore. All of that was addressed in the earnings call. Their recommendation is to stay in the course because the Peloton raised the full year guidance. They reduced the third quarter, but they raised the full gear from $1.53 billion to $1.55 billion. That is a 68% year-over-year at the midpoint. That is crazy high growth. As I said in the last episode, it’s going to be between 920,000 and 930,000 subscribers. That is an increase of 81% in subscribers at the midpoint over last year 2019. Those are fantastic numbers.

Basically, it’s a bunch of people that want to make money right now and they’re mad about it.

That’s the way the stock market is.

They’re like, “Gut your company and give us all the cash now and then we will love you.”

They haven’t figured out that Peloton is different.

JJ had resurfaced.

Jennifer Jacobs, for those of you who are new to the community, she popped up on the internet. She was on the television show, I’m sure everybody’s heard of called The Doctors. Jennifer Jacobs was on and she was in a segment that they were talking about how to get out of a weight loss plateau. There was also one of our own Pelotoner, Sherri. I know she is a Peloton owner and I know she has worked with Jennifer Jacobs. Jennifer Jacobs had tips for her. They worked out together. They did a whole thing and Jennifer Jacobs did a great job. I think that she is hitting the media circuit hard. She is trying to make her own niche as an influencer outside of Peloton.

I think that’s smart. If you want my tips for overcoming the weight loss plateau, I would recommend the stomach flu. The Peloton Prophet has returned and has a new prediction for us.

Lots of people have been asking. I have been getting messages daily, “When is the new super studio opening?” The Prophet says in March. I don’t have an exact date. The Peloton Prophet did not give me one, but The Peloton Prophet is very confident it’s happening in March. That means for those of you keeping score, we’re going to have all new experiences during homecoming. We don’t know how big the studio is going to be or how many bikes there will be or how many treads there will be. We do know that it’s all going to be in one place. How amazing will that be?

That’s pretty cool. Do we know anything about places to wait nearby?

We don’t. It’s in Hudson Yards, which actually is huge. It’s like a giant mall thing, I think maybe you can walk around. Don’t forget, Dr. Jenn Mann might be there, Tom.

I’ll wear a disguise. I’ll wear a tracksuit. She’ll never expect to see me in athletic wear.

Your laugh will give you away. That is very exciting though. I can’t wait to see.

It’ll be cool to see what the new digs look like. Here’s your moment of awe. There was an engagement at the studio.

It happened live. Peloton social media captured it. It was all over the place. It was right after Kendall’s ride on February 8th. It was Dina M and Jeremy B from Laredo, Texas got engaged. That was sweet. I wonder if they’re going to have the wedding at Peloton.

I’m going to predict, no. Although if they do, Matty should become an officiant.

That would be amazing.

You want to get remarried just so we could do that?

I do. I wonder if Matty would do that.

The Comeback program is officially a year old.

They have guests, but do you know how many people that they have provided comeback bikes for? One year, 400 bikes. It’s amazing. For anybody out there who say Peloton doesn’t do nice things, suck it. I disagree with those people. That is a lot of bikes. I can’t do math. Is it like five a week? That’s a whole bunch. A YouTube video was created by Peloton and it’s amazing. I feel like you need to cry if you watch this but in a good way, like in a heartwarming beautiful way. If you didn’t cry Tom, you have a heart of stone.

I do have a heart of stone though.

This is a beautiful video. They did such a good job on it.

My heart only is malleable for you and I guess the kids and stuff. They’re okay. Matty and Anna made a trip to Cleveland. There are not a lot of cities people in St Louis can make fun of. I feel like Cleveland is one of them. Look at all the cool bands they won’t let in.

That’s true. That is a really good point.

Take that Cleveland listeners.

They also had a wonderful visit from Matty Maggiacomo and Anna Greenberg. They were there for a meet and greet on February 12th. You could get all of your gear personalized if you brought it in. I’m super jelly because we didn’t have that here.

They had a little machine that would stitch your name on it?

Yes.

That’s spiffy. You could probably find a store that would do that.

I know, but there’s something about having it done officially. I like the official stuff. There’s a ton of illegal Etsy stores out there that I can buy Peloton knock-on stuff, but I would like to buy the real Peloton stuff.

I bought a cool Clip Out Crystal shirt. It’s just not the same.

They take the logo and use it in these illegal Etsy stores. It’s pretty egregious. The ones on Instagram are really bad though.

It’s like those Facebook t-shirts that lists 100 adjectives, “I’m a soccer drive mom who loves starfruit and once went to Australia and also now I have a t-shirt.” What is happening? It’s like someone threw a bunch of refrigerator magnet poetry at a T-shirt. There’s a new artist series. They’re doing Peloton’s celebration of artists I’ve met. The last time it was The Spinners. This time it’s with smokey Robinson.

The first one is with Hannah Marie Corbin. There’s going to be a ride on Thursday the 13th at 8:30 PM Eastern. Hannah is also doing a Post-Ride Stretch On Demand on Sunday. Then Matty is doing a stretch on Valentine’s Day at 8:35 AM Eastern and Denis Morton is doing a 30-minute Yoga Flow on Tuesday the 18th at 6:00 PM Eastern. It’s all good stuff. The ten-minute stretches really threw me off. They’d never done that before, so I’m curious.

Finally, there’s an instructor quote collection that’s on sale.

It’s been up, but they brought back everything and they placed it under the Sale tab. In the past, it was a new collection. When you went to the page, it was right there but this one was buried under the Sale tab. A lot of people missed it, but they brought back all of the sports bras for all the instructor quotes that were in the winter collection last year. They have all the t-shirts. Aall of the instructor stuff was back. I think we’re down to very limited selection again, but there was everything a couple of days ago.

The takeaway here though is maybe every once in a while, you have to come through those other sections.

You should keep an eye out on that sale one because they don’t announce it all the time. When they do announce it, they announced it after it’s been up for a while. For those people that constantly keep an eye on the boutique, they get the dibs and then they tell everybody on Facebook and it’s gone. I’m one of those people, so that would be me. Sorry.

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Joining us is Nicole O’Mara. Nicole, how is it going?

I’m good. How are you?

We’re excited this is happening.

Me too, I’m very excited. I’ve been thinking about it since you emailed me.

Tell us how you originally found Peloton.

Peloton came into my life because my very good friend was an avid SoulCycler. She was preparing for her wedding and she was spending so much money on taking these SoulCycle classes that her husband had said, “You have to stop doing this.” She did some research and found out that there was this bike that came out that you can purchase and take these classes from home. Me not being athletic or doing any physical activity, I made fun of her and said, “This is ridiculous. You’re going to ride a bike in your apartment.” She said, “Yes.” I realized I hadn’t purchased my husband a birthday present yet. I said, “This is the time. I’m going to do this.” I bought it and they called me later that day and said it’s coming in a week, which was perfect because it arrived on his birthday. I was thinking, “He uses Spin many years ago, this will be pretty good.” During that time, I was doing a lot of research about it. I said, “I want to get into shape. I want to lose some weight. This is something that I want.” Even though it was a present for him, I still say it’s my bike.

How does he feel about that?

It's wonderful to have instructors that care enough to get to know you. Click To Tweet

When we would argue over whose turn it was to take a class, he’d say, “This is my present.” I’d say, “I bought it.” I would always win. It was a battle in the beginning.

You said you weren’t working out before this. You work out all the time, so I didn’t realize that.

I lived in the city for several years. While I was there, I had a personal trainer because even though I belong to a gym, I couldn’t trust myself to go. If I did go, I wouldn’t know what to do. Someone wasn’t forcing me to do something. I got a trainer. When I moved out of the city, I was here for a few years and did absolutely nothing. To get a bike and to all of a sudden start working out with something that was completely new to us. It was a great addition for us.

Who has more rides?

I do. He did celebrate his 250th. We went into Studio Four and it was great.

I can’t remember what number on. I was like, “I know it’s a lot more than 250.”

It would have been a lot more, but I had bought the tread years ago. That’s what had happened.

What do you think your fitness level is now compared to then?

It was a zero then. I work in the city so walking up subway stairs. I used to not be able to do that without huffing and puffing. I’m able to do that. I did the Peloton 5K. I remember Alex had a 90-minute ride. I must have taken that class twenty times. Being able to have a cardio level that I could do at all is something that’s mind-boggling to me that I have the ability to do pretty much anything after not doing anything for a long time.

You got the tread, how did you end up forming the You Get To Crew? How did that happen?

Having the bike, I immediately fell in love with Alex. I loved his positive vibes. I love hip hop music. It was an instructor that I immediately had a connection with besides him being easy on the eyes. The thing was important to me, wanting to take a class because you love the music and liking the person and their vibe. When I had gotten the tread, my friend Gina had said to me, “If you like Alex, you’re going to love this girl, Jess.” I got the tread and I saw that she had a twenty-minute ‘90s hip hop class. I said, “If there’s nothing else in the world, I love more than ‘90s hip-hop.” I took it.

Song after song was as if it was being taken off of my playlists. The songs that my friends say, “I can’t believe you still listen to this music,” I was like, “This is great.” Her vibe is so positive and great that I fell in love with her immediately. Her tagline, “You don’t have to, you get to.” It’s a privilege to be able to move our bodies like this. It’s something that hit home for me a lot because I didn’t know physical activity for such a long time. I also was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis many years ago. Being a young woman living with MS and I couldn’t find anything that I wanted to do to improve myself physically, it was something that was hard to wrap my head around.

When she said, “You don’t have to do this. You get to do this,” it took my breath away because riding the bike, I would do it because there are many people out there that are physically unable to do that. It’s something that I would always think of whenever I would step into any class. As soon as she said that, I was like, “This is amazing.” I was at the bike studio with the Feel Good Family. We were taking one of Alex’s Club Bangers classes and she walked past me. I stopped her and I said, “You’re Jess Sims.” She said, “Yes.”

At first, I thought that she was shocked that she had been recognized. Little did I know that Gina had done the same thing two seconds before in the lobby. She was coming off of her fangirling and she turns a corner and I’m like, “I need to come into a studio. I want to take a class with you.” She said, “Anytime you want.” I spoke to a couple of my other girlfriends that were liking her. I said, “We should do this.” Every week I would go in and I would see her. I said, “We started this tribe and we’re at 100 members. We’re at 200 members.” She was flattered and blown away because at that time, she was the newish tread instructor. We hit 1,300 members and it happened in less than a year.

It is crazy particularly since she arrived at either the tail end or after all the rest of the instructors had left the group. It is fascinating that it’s grown as much as it has, considering that she’s not even in the group. You do a great job of allowing Jess to have a voice in the group through you. That’s awesome that you do that.

She wants to play as much of a role as she can. The instructors are very limited in what they can do with their tribes, but if something great is going on like I’ll ask her advice on something. We do a lot of challenges. I’ll say, “We’re doing a monthly challenge. How do you think we should balance this?” I’m not a fitness instructor. I don’t know what I’m doing. I want everyone to be able to do what they’re physically able to do and to do it safely. She’ll say, “Be careful. Don’t work out too much. A rest day is important.” She’ll give the advice to us, which is great. She’ll interact with us as much as she can. The tread instructors are lucky because the classes are small. If you’ve ever taken a class with her live, there’s a five-minute window between when the camera starts and when it goes live for a replay. During those five minutes, she’ll ask everybody in the studio their name, where they’re from and something funny like, “What’s your favorite food?” She cares that she wants to know about everybody. It’s wonderful to have an instructor that cares about that stuff.

Since you have a tread too, where do you gravitate there?

My bike has collected a lot of dust since I’ve gotten the tread. I feel very accomplished on the treadmill because I’d never run before. My friends have run marathons and I say, “You are out of your mind.” The fact that I can even keep up any pace, I amaze myself. I feel very accomplished on the tread. I liked the bootcamps. I like being able to take the class and go on the floor and do weights and stuff. I feel proud after taking a biking class, but the tread for some reason all of a sudden, I feel like, “I could be a runner even though I may run slower.” I think that I’m moving in the direction of being a runner.

I never realized it because it’s about exercise, so I never thought about it. How many people are intimidated by running versus biking?

When you’re running, you’re propelling yourself, your entire body. Whereas biking, you’re using your legs to propel yourself on wheels. It’s a lot harder to run than it is to bike. That’s why it’s so intimidating. When you don’t have the fastest speeds like myself, you can see an improvement as well as you go through time. I was never super-fast on the bike either. I don’t know because there are so many people that own the bike, there are a lot of people that are at the bottom of the leaderboard with me. On the tread, that’s not necessarily true.

Who was the tread a present for?

A few years ago, at HRI and the buzz was the tread because they had announced it and everyone was talking about it. My husband, his name is Lucas, he said, “This tread seems interesting,” because they were talking about the bootcamps and stuff like that. I went and saw the other room and I reserved one. Funny enough, it came the week before Christmas, so there you go. It was his Christmas present. They wheeled it in. He was like, “What is that?” I’m like, “Merry Christmas.” He’s like, “What?” The same arguments happened. I thought it was my birthday present, I should be able to ride it. That’s my Christmas present. I should be able to run. I’m like, “Take it easy over there.” I live my life with it’s easier to ask for forgiveness than it is to ask for permission.

I was picturing the conversation when he was like, “That sounds interesting,” and you’re like, “If you insist.” He was like, “I didn’t insist.”

Do you consider Jess your favorite instructor on the tread, but Alex is still your favorite bike instructor? How do you manage that?

Alex is my person on the bike. I have nothing against any of the other instructors, but as you know, you vibe with one person more. Jess is definitely my person on the tread. I love her techniques. She’s funny, quirky and she says things sometimes, I’m like, “What?” With the whole You Get To Crew, we laugh at it. It’s not that we mock her because that’s not what we’re doing. Can you believe that Jess says that she can’t stand the word bulb? I’m at home and I’m like, “What did she say?” You have a whole conversation about it and it’s hysterical. We’ll change our pitchers to things that she doesn’t like, hashtag in different locations to stick it to her. She interacts well and she’s very quirky. I liked the way that she teaches classes. I feel like I’m able to follow her well and she’s a nice person.

I like her listening games. I liked how playful she is with the other instructors. When she went on the trip with Becs and she had all those funny things, those were the best Instagram stories ever until Matty scared the crap out of her. Tom, I don’t know if you’ve seen it, but I’m sure you’ve seen it. Matty is going to do her class for her and so she did an age progression filter on Matty for the class and he’s an old man in the picture. She said, “Grandpa Matty.”

The banter back and forth is great. It’s very playful, but they’re also supportive of each other.

Do you think that the community for the tread is different than the community for the bike?

The community for the tread is how the community for the bike was when the bike first started. I’ve had the bike for several years. I remember taking classes and there were 400, 500 people in the class. Even when I started to take the tread classes, there were 40 people in the class. There were 400 people in it the class when Jess did it. Matty’s Gaga run, there are a lot of people in it, but it’s great to have been in the beginning because when you see the same 40 names on the leaderboard, you get to know them a little bit better. It’s the same thing when I was on the bike. You would see the same people in your classes and you meet them in person and you get to make that connection.

I feel that everyone that got the tread that it’s being had is very similar to how the bike was when the bike first started. Everyone is very tight-knit. I want that to continue in the You Get To Crew because everybody there was inspiring. They amaze me with their accomplishments. It’s nothing against people who ride the bike because they’re amazing too. When someone tells you they ran a marathon, you can’t help but be in awe of those people. We started doing this thing in which we feature somebody every single day. I asked people who want to participate to send me their leaderboard name, something about themselves, what you do for a living, your favorite memory of Jess and why you consider yourself to be a badass.

The things that people say that they have accomplished, we’re talking cancer survivors, people that are living with cancer, parents of twins, people that have one child, people who have special needs kids. Someone who tore both of their ACLs and then played basketball in college. Someone who got hit by a car and ran a marathon. A woman who plays first out of all women in this di-tri competition. These people are amazing. I’m in awe of them. I’m lucky to be with them. There was a woman that we featured and she said that Peloton allowed her to step back into her power.

That made me warm and fuzzy because that’s exactly what we’re doing every single time. We’re getting on the bike or stepping onto this tread. We’re taking the power back. We’re taking time for ourselves. Everyone could be doing a million other things every single time but they choose to get on one of those pieces of equipment. I feel that us showing up for each other, we’re showing up for the instructors also. To have a leaderboard go from 40 people to 400, how great does that make you feel? How great does that make the instructors feel? I feel like that because it’s starting up, that community is tight. It’s an amazing thing to be a part of because everyone was amazing.

Part of that comes from the leadership within each group because every group has their own vibe. I appreciate how you have such a positive personality and you’re always cheering people on and saying great things to people. I know lots of other people appreciate that too. You have a lot to do with that community doing well.

Thank you. I appreciate them.

Do you have that in your job place?

No, definitely not. I’m a private banker in Manhattan. I’m positive for my clients but no. When I was first diagnosed with MS, I had this calm that came over me and I said to myself, “I’m going to be living with this for the rest of my life. I need to be strong. I need to be mentally there.” As I was coming to terms with it myself, I realized that my family around me was having a harder time than I was having. Coming to terms with this is something that’s happening to me. I tried to be extra strong for them. I realized that that’s something that I’ve carried with me. The number of times I said, “I’m fine,” when I wasn’t, but I had to be fine for them because they were falling apart in the inside.

I have that positivity in me. I want everything to be fine because it has to be. In the group when it’s like, “I wanted to get three miles in my 30-minute class,” it’s like, “You got 2.98. You’ll get it next time. Everything’s fine. We’re all doing a great job. We’re all showing up. We’re all here for each other.” If I’m taking a class that’s on-demand and one of my friends had gotten a milestone and called out, “Congratulations on your 200th run.” I cheer as if I’m standing right next to them screaming behind them to keep going. It’s a crazy thing that you have this connection to people virtually. It’s an amazing thing. To answer your question, no, I do not have that in my career in the least. I feel like it’s something that I had grown into, for sure.

This question is non-Peloton related, but I’m curious what exactly does a private banker do?

I have a very wide range of clients, mostly based in Manhattan. Anything that you need as a business owner, I do for you and I make your life a lot easier than it needs to be. You call me when you need a transaction to be done, you need to order checks, you need that. It’s a lot of schmoozing. I’m interacting with people all day, so maybe that does help me with my interactions with people. I talk to everybody and make their lives a lot easier.

Are you an employee of the bank and they assign you to certain people or do people say, “I need a private banker,” and they hire you one-on-one? How does that work?

I’m an employee of the bank and I bring in my own clients. If you’re looking for a banker to bank The Clip Out, give me a call.

It’d be a lot of like, “Can you make sure our overdraft protection is working?” You worked for the bank, but you go and find the clients. How do you find people that need private banks? That seems like such a niche.

It’s going on meeting people. It’s very interesting because if you talk to a business owner and you say, “Who do you bank with?” They name one of the megabanks, and it’s like, “How is that working out for you?” They say, “They don’t care about me. I’m a client to them.” I’ll say, “If you ever want personal care, let me know and we can set something up.” It’s amazing how much people don’t know that they need a private banker until they have one. It’s a very interesting job. I love my job. I’ve been at the bank for several years.

Were you always in banking or did you fall into that?

I was always in banking professionally. I went to college for criminal justice and forensic science and I stepped into banking. I knew that I will work at a bank and they got me in and I switched to the bank that I’m at. When I first started, I worked in the compliance department and the anti-money laundering area. I switched over to a sales position. I switched over to the private banking position.

How often do you get in the studio?

It’s as much as I can. Jess’s schedule changed. She used to teach 5:30 on Thursdays and I would go every Thursday. I try and go in every Saturday that I can. It’s great because I’m very fortunate. I live 40 minutes outside of the city. I work in Manhattan so I can leave work, take a class and go home. On the weekends and stuff, especially people that want to come in, it’s amazing. The You Get To Crew, they fly from everywhere to come in for these classes. I feel very responsible that when they’re coming in, I try and organize things, whether it’s a group class. I was emailing with the studio.

I have three group classes booked. We have people coming in. I have a group of friends that I met through the tread. It was like you had to take a certain number of classes every week. I was placed on a team with these five amazing people and I clicked with them immediately. I talked to these women every single day. We are on Messenger all day. They’re all coming in. I took off of work and we are doing all things Peloton. I feel like they’re my best friends. It’s like I’ve known them forever. We’re taking Jess’s class and they can’t wait to meet her. The majority of them had never even been in the studio before. They’re flying in from all over. We have someone coming in from Utah. We have somebody coming in from here and from there, so I use it as an excuse. I say to my husband, “I have to go, my people are coming in. I have to organize everything.” It’s great to meet people face to face. As much as I can, I’ll be in the studio.

What is your leaderboard name?

My leaderboard name is CocoLoco6. Obviously, my name is Nicole. When I was born, my older sister couldn’t say Nicole so she called me Coco. My entire family calls me Coco. It’s very rare that anyone ever calls me Nicole. The Loco comes in because I’m a little crazy and the number six because my birthday is on the sixth. It’s been a name that I’ve had my entire life.

Do you find that being a little crazy is something people look for in a private banker?

What’s interesting about it is that I remember when my sister had come to the city one day because she lives in Ohio. She came to the city and she said, “I want to see where you work. I need to see you in a professional setting.” I said, “Sure.” She comes in and everyone’s like, “Nicole’s sister is here. We have to meet her.” She said to my boss, “Is Nicole different in work than she is outside of work?” My boss is a young guy. He’s a couple of years older than me. He said, “No, she’s the exact same person.” My sister said, “That’s petrifying.” I can’t be anything other than like how I normally am. People love it.

It sounds like it’s a career based on relationships. If you have a little personality, you have no relationships.

When I joined my boss’s team, he said, “When it comes down to it, it doesn’t matter what you know because you don’t know what I can teach you, but people like you and that’s what we need.” I said, “Me, sure, whatever.”

Are you from the New York area or the Ohio area?

I’m from the New York area. I grew up on Long Island. I went to school in Pennsylvania and when I graduated, I moved right into the city when I had first started working.

Your sister grew up in New York and moved to Ohio, she’s doing it backward.

She’s a professor at the University of Dayton. After all of her many years of schooling, that’s where she settled.

Do you have any advice for people starting out with the bike or the tread?

I would suggest taking classes with every single instructor. Once you find your people, connect with their tribe. I don’t think that I would have enjoyed the biking community of Peloton as much as I do if I hadn’t met the Feel Good Family. The same thing with the You Get To Crew. If I didn’t have them, I don’t think that I would enjoy it as much because I feel you get good friendships with that. Set a schedule for yourself so you know that every single day you’re going to take this class at this time. You’re depending on yourself to show up every single day. If you set a schedule, find your people and everything will fall into place.

How can people find you on social media?

You Get To Crew on Facebook and @YouGet2Crew on Instagram.

Thank you so much for taking the time out of your busy private banking day.

Thank you.

—

That wraps up another episode. What do you have in store for people in the next episode?

I am excited because Tunde is on the next episode. I got to introduce her because Tom wasn’t here at the beginning.

That’s a story we will tell in the next episode. I was running late for no fault of my own as you can tell because we are still married.

That is true.

That is what people will have to look forward to.

Tunde tells a lot of stories. You do not want to miss it.

Until then, where can people find you?

People can find me at Facebook.com/CrystalDOkeefe. They can find me on Instagram, Twitter or on the Bike and at the Tread at @ClipOutCrystal.

You can find me on Twitter, @RogerQBert or on Facebook at Facebook.com/tomokeefe. You can find the show online at Facebook.com/theclipout. While you’re there, like the page, join the group. Don’t forget we’re available wherever you get your podcast. Be sure and subscribe, so you’ll never miss an episode. Sign up for our newsletter at theclipout.com. That’s it. Thanks for tuning in. Until next time, keep pedaling and running.