Hacker News Reader

Comment by TomVDB | Hacker News Reader

> How many people are willing to spend thousands on an exercise bike?

Tons of them.

I've had a bunch of setups where you could plug in your road bike into a stationary setup, with virtual screen and everything, but the hassle of setting it up was always just a little too much friction.

It'd be the logical N+1 addition to my stable of more expensive road, cross and mountain bikes.

You have no idea how much people are willing to spend on their cycling hobby.

If I want a one hour work-out, going to the gym adds 2 times 10 minutes to go back and from. The bikes may already be taken. Music is blaring out of loudspeakers. There's no training included.

This is not about being lazy, it's about being rich enough to trade time and convenience for money.

View on HN

I don't understand Peloton because there are smart-trainers available (Wahoo Kickr, etc).

$1000 bike. $1000 trainer. $15/month for Zwift or TrainerRoad.

And you can take the bike outside when the weather is nice.

Or, for a bike enthusiast (or anybody who already owns a bike), the bike is already there. So, it's just the trainer.

Twice, I had something like a Wahoo Kickr. Twice, after repeated use, the mounting mechanism to fasten my road bike to the trainer started to fail or became very cumbersome to use.

When it did work, the tires on the road bike slipped when putting on high power.

In the end, even if it wasn't a huge inconvenience, the hassle of using the system was sufficient friction to stop me from using it, just like the overhead of going to a gym.

There is a large market for tailor-made solutions that are perfect for just one application. (See also: iPad, bike GPS computers, 10 different categories of mountain bikes, ...)

The Kickr is direct mount (remove rear wheel, mount to axle/cassette that are part of trainer). Parts could still fail, but no tire slippage.

Having to remove the rear wheel is definitely better from a slippage point of view, but now you still have the friction of removing your wheel and putting it back and getting your hands dirty in the process.

Maybe I'm just lazy after all...

But it still illustrates how something like Peleton can be appealing for many.

This is definitely not the common path for hard core cycling aficionados... They're far more likely to buy a decent trainer for their expensive road bike than a clunky exercise bike, then compete online not attend a virtual spin class. The people i know use a semi permanent setup for the off season so it's not really a hassle and far more realistic.

I agree with an earlier comment that their target market is the same as meal services, and the value proposition is debatable.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com