Visit Peloton Studio: What You Need to Know

Are you planning to visit a Peloton studio, in New York City or London? Well, let me tell you everything you need to know.

I’ve been to the Peloton studios New York nearly a dozen times since first getting our bike in 2016. This includes the old Chelsea studio, which was just for cycling, plus the bigger New York studio on Tenth Avenue. I’ve written a bunch of articles on topics related to visits including:

• how to book a live, Peloton Studio class (including dealing with the hated queue)
• how to get off the Peloton class waitlist using the Peloton booking site
• after booking classes, finding hotels closest to PSNY
• hotels near Peloton Studios London Covent Garden

However, this article is more about what you need to know the day of, what to bring, what to shop for before your visit, etc. Hopefully, I’ll cover everything that will put your mind at ease before you step foot into 370 10th Avenue in New York City. That’s the address of PSNY in Hudson Yards.

Preparing for your visit to Peloton Studio

Once you’ve done all the hard work of preparing for your visit to Peloton — the travel booking, having good luck getting into classes, using the email confirmations to add classes to your calendar — now the fun starts. And for me that’s shopping before you pack.

Because it’s important to know what you can and should bring to Peloton Studios and what not to bother with. This is especially important if this is your first visit to PSNY or PSL. Trust me: you’re going to have a great time.

What to bring with you to the studio

In hopes that you get something off the waitlist spots — or if you’ve booked an in-person class — here’s what you should bring with you for or wear to your studio visit. Let’s start with what you should pack to wear.

Clothing and shoes for cycling classes

If you’re taking a cycling class in Studio 1 at PSNY, you can bring your cycling shoes from home. The bikes at the studio have dual-clip pedals — meaning you can clip in with the Delta cleat from your home bike as I’ve always done. However, that also means you can clip in with SPD cleats on the other side.

Don’t want to schlep your shoes in your suitcase? No problem. You can borrow shoes for free. PSNY stocks the original Peloton cycling shoe and the newer Altos shoes.

The one thing you cannot do is ride with regular sneakers. None of the pedals I’ve seen in the Peloton studio have toe cages.

As far as clothes, wear what you normally would wear to ride at home. If that’s padded shorts, bring ’em. If you ride in leggings, bring them.

Here’s what I will tell you, though. If you’re taking longer rides in the studio — longer than 45 minutes — I would opt for padded bottoms. If you have lady parts like I do, ride without underwear under your leggings. The amount of time you’ll spend in the seat is going to make your butt hurt to the point that you won’t be able to enjoy class.

Finally, the cycling studio starts off freezing and then gets really hot. I prefer a sleeveless top, headband for sweat and hair tie for a ponytail. The locker room at PSNY stocks the latter so you can get hair ties for free.

Clothing and shoes for all other classes

There are four studios at PSNY. One for cycling, one for Tread-related classes, one for strength, cardio and Row classes and one for yoga.

In the first three, you’ll wear shoes. As I’ve mentioned, cycling shoes for Studio 1. Then for the other two where you wear shoes, you’ll want sneakers, tennis shoes, trainers or whatever word or words you use to describe athletic footwear.

In yoga classes you go barefoot. However, you could also wear gripper socks like you might for a Pilates Reformer class.

Other than any specialty footwear, you’ll want to wear regular workout clothes. So shorts and a t-shirt for guys and tops and leggings for women.

Note: Peloton allows women to wear strappy, crop tops or sports bras in class. However, they do not allow men to take off their shirts. So keep that in mind.

Peloton merch and attire

Let’s be honest. We’re all in the Peloton cult. And when you visit the Peloton studio, you’ll see lots of people wearing Peloton-brand clothing. I’ll admit to succumbing to peer pressure and buying Peloton shirts and leggings while at the studio.

Upstairs in PSNY is a store if you want to purchase something. That’s where I’ve shopped. They let you try clothes on in the Peloton locker rooms, which are also on the top floor. They sell clothing and all kinds of accessories, including Peloton friendship bracelets like you might wear to a Taylor Swift concert. These Peloton bracelets are available online, too.

You can also access this Peloton store from the Manhattan West Plaza near the NHL store and Whole Foods. It’s the only area of the Peloton Studio that you can visit without having booked a class.

Recently, Peloton renovated the top floor of PSNY to expand the store. There used to be a lounge there where you could hang out in between classes. I have a feeling that’s all gone now and it’s all retail space. I’ll double check the next time I visit.

Shopping for Peloton items to bring with you

Here’s some additional merch you may want to buy in advance of your trip.

I treated myself to this Peloton headband at the Peloton store inside PSNY. It kept the sweat off my face through Logan’s strength class. These days, it’s my favorite workout headband. It’s also available on the Peloton Amazon store.

However, Peloton also sells a Lululemon headband online. In case you didn’t know, Peloton and Lululemon have partnered in the apparel space.

Other necessities for a Peloton studio visit

If you’re going to be taking multiple classes in a day like I did, then you’ll want to bring a change of clothing. However, you won’t have time to shower after class and before taking pictures with instructors. Neither will any of the other Peloton members who just dismounted a Peloton bike in Studio 1 or a Peloton Tread in Studio 4 — or whichever class they just took.

So, accept the fact that in your pictures with Jess Sims or Emma Lovewell or any of the other instructors, you are going to be sweaty. Embrace it.

The Peloton employees are the ones taking pictures so no need to worry about bringing a camera. Also, they ask that you put your phone away when you’re waiting in line. These employees are all super nice and patient as members are fangirling or fanboying over their favorite Peloton instructors. So, be super nice to them, too.

The Peloton Studio locker rooms are beautifully appointed spaces, with high-end cleansing products (all from Malin + Goetz), fluffy towels and nearly a dozen showers. I recommend bringing a pair of flip flops to wear in the showers to protect your feet.

There are free, drawstring plastic bags in the locker room to put your sweaty clothes in, like I did below.

Also, there are a bunch of lockers for storing your things. The lockers were big enough to store my roller bag suitcase. The locker room has double-sided mirrors and Dyson Supersonic hair dryers, plus hair ties, bobby pins, makeup remover wipes, lotion and more.

Bring a refillable water bottle

In addition, like throughout Peloton Studio, there is a water-filling station in the locker rooms. So you’ll definitely want to bring your own water bottles.

If you want the full-on Peloton merch experience, you can bring a logo bottle with you but any old one will do as long as it’s base is not too wide. In other words, if it fits in your bike bottle tray, you’ll be fine. Anything with a bigger base, not so much.

Additional things to keep in mind when visiting Peloton studios

Here are some additional, random things to keep in mind if you’re planning a visit to PSNY.

Getting off the waitlist and into classes

I know that Peloton has changed the process for how you get into the cycling studio as well as how you get off the waitlist. Now, you can do a day-of, walk-in standby list for all the classes. Also, you used to get a restaurant-like buzzer when you were waiting to find out if you got into a waitlisted class. Now you give your phone number and they’ll text you either way.

Boarding pass cards to get into classes

Now you need a card and a wristband to get into classes. There are four levels of cards:

• silver
• black
• red
• white

My sources tell me that silver cards are for friends of instructors, black cards are for first timers or those with a milestone (wonder if my birthday will count) and red is for everyone else. White cards are for people who’ve been to PSNY multiple times. So, basically, they’re at the back of the line.

Leave enough time if you’re taking multiple classes

If you’re considering booking multiple classes on the same day at the NYC Peloton Studios, make sure you give yourself enough time in between classes. For example, doors close for classes 15 minutes before a class’s start time. So let’s say you’ve taken a 30-minute class. After that, you want pictures with the instructor. Plus, you want to make the next class before the doors close.

Enough time for pictures with instructors

For example, on my recent trip to PSNY, I took an 8:00 a.m. class with Denis Morton. It was 30 minutes long. Then, I was on the waitlist for a 10:00 Denis yoga class. That meant I needed to check in at the front desk one hour before–or at 9:00 a.m.

However, I was nowhere near getting my picture taken by that time and had to leave the line. So, I stopped a Peloton employee and explained my predicament. I was so surprised when he suggested I jump the line, get my picture taken with Denis (see it below) and then go check in for my next class. That was so nice and truly unexpected.

This probably isn’t official Peloton policy or anything, and I may have been lucky enough to do this. Therefore, if you book classes too close together, you’re likely not going to make it. So I would definitely book at least an hour buffer in between those multiple classes. I know I will in the future as I felt really awkward

Final thoughts on what to bring for a Peloton studio visit

Hopefully, I’ve answered all of your questions about what to pack, bring or wear before a visit to the Peloton studio. Like I mentioned at the top, these recommendations are based on my visiting PSNY multiple times.

As soon as I get across the pond to visit PSL, I’ll fill in a section about what you need to know for that space. However, in the meantime, if you’ve visited Peloton Studios London and have suggestions that fit with the theme of this article, please post a comment and let me know.