 Hey y'all, what's up? My name is Sonali. Today I have another fitness video for you guys and if you have watched my videos before, you guys know I've been on a health journey ever since I moved to Austin, which was about two years ago and I just actually did two months of this treadmill routine that has been viral on TikTok, but I kind of wanted to switch it up. So I got a bike. This video is actually sponsored by Echelon and I'm going to be reviewing their EX5S Connect bike. I tried the bike out for five days and vlogged it all for you guys, so let's get this video started. It's day one of using my Echelon bike. For the first time ever, I just wanted to vlog my whole experience, first impressions and everything. I'm definitely what you would consider a beginner at cycling. I did one class when I was in college like so freaking long ago and it was like so hard. So it kind of scared me into never going back to a cycling class again, but ever since quarantine happened, everyone has been getting cycling bikes and I've just been getting so intrigued by it. So I wanted to try this Echelon bike out and I'll let you guys know exactly what I think of it, but first I need to put on my tennis shoes. I just put on my tennis shoes and I know a lot of other like spin bikes you have to like click into. I'm not sure if like you can actually wear normal shoes on the other ones, but this one you can, which is really nice because I didn't have to like purchase any new shoes. So I'm just wearing my hokas. I'm able to slide my feet in the bike and let me just show you the bike. Let me give you a bike tour. This is what the bike looks like. We ended up putting it in our bedroom because luckily we have a lot of space in our bedroom. What I really liked about this bike in specific is that it actually came with a built-in screen and the other ones you would have to use like a tablet of some sort. So I wanted a screen that I wouldn't have to like make sure it's charged. So now we are gonna pick my class, which I feel like this is gonna be a hard choice. They do have like 10 minute boot camps which is definitely calling my name. Oh, it says beginner classes up here. Teen rides right here. That's kind of nice, but I want something with like really good music. This Zumba party ride section looks super fun. So I think I might do one of these. If you guys have been keeping up with my health journey, I have been doing 12, 330, which is a treadmill routine and you do it for 30 minutes. So I really didn't know how long to expect these bike rides to be. I honestly thought it was like 45 minutes. It was gonna be the least amount of time that I would have to go through a class, but I'm really glad that there are faster classes. So I can just knock one out on my lunch break. Is that straight? Yeah. Is it like you're extending your leg all the way? Yeah. Well, almost. It's probably fine then. Look, she's doing this. It looks so easy. I finished in 58th place out of 255 people. No way. Yeah. I'm done with my class. That was such a good workout. I burned 180 calories in 20 minutes, which I feel like is really good. And I'm gonna get my class of five star rating. That was honestly pretty hard, especially when you're actually challenging yourself with the resistance. I'm already feeling my legs getting so sore, but it's a good sore. Day two of using the echelon bike, and I'm honestly very, very pooped right now. It's like 846. So almost 9 p.m. at night. I worked during the day, and then I had three shoots, literally by the time I got off and then til sunset. So I am very tired, but I'm gonna get my butt on the bike and do one last workout of the day. Then I'm gonna shower and get in bed and go to sleep and do it all over again tomorrow. Well, let's do the fun part, choosing class. Let's go. I think this one is calling my name. I didn't see this last time, but you can actually see the class playlist, which is nice because I want songs that I actually know. So, I mean, Mike Posner, I know him, Chainsmokers, obviously. So, oh, I like Cyrus. Okay, cool. So let's get to this class. Let's do it. I just finished the class. I actually really liked it better than the Zumba one because they did play songs that I knew. And the Zumba was just instrumental even though I feel like that instructor was more like hype, but I did like hearing songs than I knew. I did burn, let's check the calories, 197 total calories. I feel like I could have put in a little bit more effort, but like I said, I pooped and now my legs are so sore. They feel so tight. They're probably gonna be really sore tomorrow, but now it's time to shower and I crush day two. Day three of using my echelon bike today, my hair's a little bit crazy. I do need to wash it soon, but I think I'm gonna try to hold out. I'm thinking about doing like a stretching class of some sort. So with this echelon bike, you can actually move the screen at like flips over so you can do like a stretching class, a strength class, literally all these other classes. You don't have to just do cycling, which is really cool. This is where the hinge is and I'm just gonna bring it down like that and the screen flips. I flipped it and it registered that it flipped. So here we go, logging in and now we can pick our class. Also, I did want to show you when you log in, you can see all these live classes. So you can join live and like kind of compete with other people in the class, which is awesome. This bar is what I wanted to show you. So you have cycling right here. We did that the past two days. We have strength, we have toning and we have stretching. All right, I decided on this one, we're gonna do French stretch for 20 minutes and it's gonna be the lower body. That class was actually in French. I just, I don't know why I saw it was like French but you know how they sometimes use that as like an adjective? So the girl definitely was speaking French but it's okay because I didn't really need to hear like, oh, turn up the resistance. So I could just like fall along with the stretch. That was honestly really needed. I feel like I never stretched before or after my workouts and it's so bad because I just want to get it over with, you know? Like I just feel like my time is very valuable. So I just feel like stretching is a waste of time but it's definitely not because I know it's worth it because then you won't get as sore. So definitely need to incorporate that a little bit more but day three, done. Day four, I'm not really sure what I'm feeling today. I was almost gonna do a meditation because I just don't really feel good up here like sinuses or going wrong. Something's wrong with my ear but I kind of am in the mood to cycle. So let's go to the screen and see what we got. I just found this fusion one and they have a lot of songs that I know so I think I'm gonna go for this one. Effort into that workout and I burned 163 total calories. Day four, done. Day five of using my echelon bike and I think after a long week and it's Friday today, after a long week I need some meditation in my life. I have not meditated in so long. I used to use an app but then the trial ended. So I'm gonna do the meditation class on the bike. Let's see how it is. I'll keep you guys updated. We have these guided meditations and I think I'm gonna do a 10 minute one. Okay, that looks nice. All right, we're gonna do this one. Let's do this. It's everywhere. Back there sign of the body de-stressing from the day. I legit fell asleep. It felt like I was like sinking into like a cloud. I just laid down on my bed and I feel like so good, so relaxed, very much needed. I'm so excited about this bike. I can't wait to continue to use it because I feel like everyone that I know does cycling is so toned and just is in the best shape of their life. So I need to definitely get on a schedule. I'm gonna try to make that happen. Right now I'm like busy with grad sessions, as you guys know if you follow me on Instagram. But I'm gonna try to make the time because the best thing about this bike is that it is in your home. You don't have to go anywhere and they have so many class options. So, you know, the variety of just like things you can do, you can do like bar, you can do hit classes, you can do spin classes, of course it's a bike, meditation classes, all of that stuff. But there's also variations in the duration of the classes. So there's like 10 minute classes, 20 minute classes, 30, 45 minutes. My goal is to like work up to a 45 minute cycling class. I'm gonna be dead probably by the end of it, but I'm gonna try to work up to it. Another cool thing about this bike is that you can actually flip the screen to be able to do the other classes, like the hit workouts and, you know, the stretching one that I showed you guys. So you don't have to turn the whole bike around because right now it's in my bedroom and it's kind of like by my side of the bed, there's not too much room to walk around it. So it's just nice that it has the ability to flip the screen. I'm pretty sure I said this the first day, but you don't have to buy new shoes to like click into. I know that other cycling classes, I've heard you have to have like specific shoes or like rent shoes when you go, but this one you can just use your normal tennis shoes, slide your foot in and I never really felt unstable during the class itself. Like I never thought my foot was gonna slide out or anything, so that's great because I didn't have to spend more money there. For me, the biggest pro about an at home bike is that you don't have to worry about feeling intimidated. I obviously wanna better myself and obviously want to be more active, but sometimes I just get so intimidated walking into a gym and feeling like people are going to judge me even though they probably aren't even staring at me at all, but it's just like a mental thing, you know? So it's nice to be able to go at your own pace, especially. I mean, you have like the leaderboard and it's really cool to see where you're at within all these people that have taken the class. So you can challenge yourself that way, but if you are intimidated, like I said, it's not too much pressure to do it right or get your form right on the first try. So that's really comforting and I also recommend trying out the beginner classes as your first ones because they'll kind of go through and explain everything that you need to know, like what their resistance, what cadence is and everything like that. To have access to echelons live and just pre-recorded classes, you do have to pay for a monthly membership. So just to heads up there, they do have all the information on their website, which I'll have all the information down below so you can check it out there. As you guys saw, I've only done classes on the bike, but I'm kind of excited to just have a bike in my bedroom because I can put on the TV, watch YouTube while I bike, and it's just gonna be kind of like a me time, but I'm staying active while, you know, doing what I love watching YouTube. What is also really comforting is that they actually have a Facebook group or community online that you can join and you can ask your questions in there or even get advice from people who have been doing it for a while. And I've definitely learned a lot through the community itself and the instructors are also very just like motivating, like they want you to succeed. And even though it's not a group setting, it kind of feels like it because you are being like pushed to do your best. Honestly, if you're someone that goes to a spin studio or cycling classes regularly, I highly recommend getting an echelon bike because it's a great alternative to a gym membership and you're gonna be saving money in the long run. If you happen to be watching this and you're not interested in a cycling bike, I highly recommend checking out all their other products. They have so many. They actually have a really cool mirror product that you can watch classes on. And then they have treadmills, they have a rower, they have so much, so definitely go and check out their website. That wraps up this echelon review on the EX5S Connect bike. If you're interested in hearing more about the specs of this specific bike or any of the echelon products, all of the info will be down below as well as the links. And if you're in Miami or Chattanooga, they actually have a cycling studio there so you can sign up for a class if you're in the area. I'm really excited to be a part of the echelon community and just better myself, get healthy, get fit, subscribe for more fitness content and let me know what you guys wanna see down below and I will see y'all in my next video. Bye.