How A Flywheel Instructor Crushes Her Morning Routine (Without Coffee)

Ladders

It is one thing to get up early, then get on a train or in a car and then go sit for the majority of your day at desk. It is quite another to get up and then grab on a spin bike and inspire a group of tired, overworked people to not only exercise vigorously, but also scream and shout and maybe even dance a little first thing in the morning. But that is what Flywheel instructor Emily Fayette does every day. And then she does that two more times on most days.  Fayette has been a Flywheel instructor for a few years and has just started teaching the popular exercise brand’s new class, Tempo. The new class combines interval and endurance training creating a very effective workout. “It is our most challenging ride yet and that’s what I love as an athlete. I love to constantly be challenged. With Tempo we are using the beat of the music and with all of the choreo [choreography] and getting your intervals in you are engaging all the muscles. Your whole body is basically being one with the music.”

So how does she keep her energy up? Especially for those imperative morning classes? Well, if you think she is hooked up to an IV of coffee during class, you would be quite wrong. This is how a star Flywheel instructor does her morning routine.

She tries to get a full 8 hours of sleep

Fayette is pretty religious about getting enough sleep so she is energized for the next day. “My routine is just to get a lot of sleep,” she says. However, she does often wake up from dreams with ideas in which case she gives herself time to think them out.

She works out first thing when she wakes up

Fayette says she just does a simple five minute workout first thing when she wakes up and then hops in the shower. “I do about 10 basic moves for 30 seconds to get my blood flowing. I treat that as my morning coffee.” That’s right folks. No coffee for this gal.

She opts for matcha over coffee

Fayette, who has a health blog called The Healthy Hustle, is on board the matcha train which contains a phytonutrient called l-theanine. It gives you energy, but a more calm one than straight coffee. Vincent Pedre, M.D., author of Happy Gut, said, “The result you get is a calm alertness, without the rush and crash of coffee. L-theanine is also a mood enhancer and improves concentration,” he says. Fayette told Ladders, “I’m a little matcha obsessed so I put a scoop of that in my smoothie with berries or coconut water, so I get a little bit of protein.” She also opts for the green tea over coffee because she finds she immediately crashes after a cup of coffee which she doesn’t want when teaching.

She doesn’t follow a diet

Though you would think a spin instructor would have a strict diet, she just sticks with what will make her feel good. “I fuel my body with food that makes it feel good. So a lot of legumes and fresh fruits and vegetables. A burger and fries probably isn’t going to make me feel good later (but it will at the time!)”

She takes dance breaks

To keep her energy up, she will take a few dance breaks. “My energy is the first thing the class fuels off of and I fuel off of them so it has to be high,” she said. She also usually runs 6 miles a day in between classes as well. “I want to be able to use my energy my positivity and help others find joy out of the class. It’s all about taking joyful risks.” She suggests create a list of 10 things that make you happy, whether it is drinking coffee to listening to your favorite band, and every day do three of them.

This article originally appeared on Ladders written by Meredith Lepore.