Indoor cycling before or after weights?
After, when strength is what you are training for. An indoor cycling class is an instructor-led ride on a stationary bike, set to music: climbs, sprints and steady blocks, with you turning the resistance up and down as the instructor calls it. A 2026 review describes it as cardiovascular activity that involves the muscles of the lower limbs. Those are the same muscles that squat, lunge and deadlift, and that overlap is the whole problem.
Panissa and colleagues tested it in a lab. They took 10 physically active men, 24 years old on average, each with at least two years of aerobic and strength training behind them. On three separate days, in random order, the men did four sets of half-squats to failure at 80% of their one-rep max: once fresh, once 15 minutes after fifteen one-minute intervals on a treadmill, and once 15 minutes after the same intervals on a bike, all at their maximal intensity.
Fresh, they managed 29 reps across the four sets, on average. After the running intervals they managed 23, and after the cycling intervals 18. In weight lifted, that is about 38% less after cycling and 25% less after running, our arithmetic from the paper's table. Both kinds of interval cut the first set; only cycling also cut the second, and only the cycling drop was significant across the whole session. The authors judged the interference greater after cycling, and suggested not lifting straight after hard aerobic work, especially on a bike.
It used lab intervals, not a full class, and one session measures reps on the day, not gains over months. The authors also point out that their men were not cyclists, runners or weightlifters, whose training might change the result. Read it as a clear signal about order, from a small sample.
Why lift first rather than just accept fewer reps? In our view, what comes first in a session gets your best effort, and the research backs putting your priority there. A meta-analysis of 11 training studies that compared the order of exercises found strength increases were largest in the exercises performed at the beginning of a session. The 2026 ACSM position stand, an overview of 137 systematic reviews in healthy adults, lists lifting at the beginning of the session among the things that enhanced strength. Both are about the order of lifts, not about a class, so applying them here is our reading: put the thing you most want to improve first.
If both must share a day, leave a gap. A meta-analysis of 43 studies found explosive strength gains were smaller when aerobic and strength work were done in the same session than when they were at least 3 hours apart. Lifting in the morning and riding in the evening fits that split.
Will indoor cycling classes cost you strength over months?
Probably not by much. A review of 43 studies in healthy adults found that adding aerobic training, cycling or running, did not blunt gains in maximal strength or muscle size, though explosive strength gains were smaller, most when both shared a session. So the bigger cost of a weekly class is on the day, in the reps you lose when it comes first. The wider research on that interference is in running and lifting.
The class the day after leg day feels harder
Go, but expect the bike to feel heavier. Devantier-Thomas and colleagues took 10 male cyclists, 38 years old on average, who were new to resistance training, and gave them one leg session: three sets of six on the back squat, single-leg press, leg extension and leg curl, every set stopped short of failure. Then they tested them on the bike 24 and 48 hours later.
The riders were sore and jumped lower on both days. At the same steady power, they breathed harder and rated the effort higher than before the lifting. Yet their 10 km time-trial times did not change; the authors suggest the riders held them by changing how they rode, and their cadence did shift across the ride. A 2024 meta-analysis by the same group pooled studies of cycling after muscle-damaging exercise and found the same pattern, with one addition: peak power in sprint and ramp tests fell, while time trials held.
An indoor cycling class mixes both kinds of effort. In our view, the steady blocks will feel harder than usual and the sprints are where you will be down, so ride by feel and take a turn off the resistance when the instructor calls the hardest efforts. A review of muscle soreness suggests easing the intensity and length of training for a day or two after a session that leaves you very sore, or training the parts least affected.
The soreness eases with practice, the effect on the bike less so. The same cyclists repeated the identical leg session at least two weeks later and were less sore the second time, and pedalled a little more efficiently, yet their jumps, their breathing and their sense of effort in steady riding were affected about as much as the first time. Soreness is most common when the lifting is new or follows a break, which is why the soreness review advises bringing in new or eccentric work over one or two weeks.
The other way round, the class the day before your heavy legs, is usually fine. In a small study of 16 men, leg press reps were down 4 and 8 hours after aerobic exercise and back to normal at 24 hours, and the authors concluded the impairment appears localised to the muscle groups involved.
Does an indoor cycling class count as a strength session?
No. It counts as a hard session, just not that kind. A 2026 systematic review of 17 studies of indoor cycling in adults found it consistently associated with high-intensity physiological demand, and summarised that a 20-minute ride at 80 to 90% of maximum heart rate has positive effects. Most of those studies were small and few were controlled or long-term, so the review is better at saying how hard a class is than what it does over months. Its authors add that the intensity could carry risks for people who are untrained, sedentary or living with a medical condition; if that is you, check with a doctor first and build up.
The 2024 Adult Compendium of Physical Activities, a widely used reference for how intense activities are, puts a stationary bike class at 9.0 METs. Its vigorous band starts at 6.0. That is a population average, and yours depends on how hard you ride, but it puts a class firmly among the hard sessions of your week.
Strength is a different stimulus. The ACSM position stand found voluntary strength was enhanced by loads of 80% of one-rep max or more, for 2 to 3 sets, through a full range of motion. In our view, a class asks your legs for thousands of pedal strokes against resistance far below a heavy squat, which trains fitness, not maximal strength. That is why the class competes with your leg day for fresh legs rather than replacing it, and why a day with a class on it is a training day, never a rest day.
Where the class sits against your lifting
Here is each placement, its verdict and the evidence behind it. The short version: the class is easiest beside upper-body lifting, and when legs share its day, the legs go first.
| Where the class sits | Verdict | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Before legs, the same day | The weakest choice when the leg session matters. Swap the order or move the lifting. | Cycling intervals 15 minutes before half-squats cut reps from 29 to 18 over four sets (Panissa). |
| After legs, the same day | The order to choose when both must share a day. Leave a few hours between them if you can. | Strength gains are largest in what you do first (Nunes, ACSM). Explosive strength suffered more in the same session than with 3 hours or more between (Schumann). |
| Before upper body, the same day | A good fit. | Straight after four 4-minute cycling intervals, squats slowed but the bench press did not (Dragutinovic). After aerobic work, the impairment appeared to be confined to the muscles involved (Sporer and Wenger). |
| The day after heavy legs | Fine. Expect it to feel harder and ease off on the sprints. | Steady riding felt harder 24 and 48 hours after a leg session; time-trial times held (Devantier-Thomas, 2024 study). Peak power in sprints fell after muscle damage (2024 meta-analysis). |
| The day before heavy legs | Usually fine. | Leg press reps were down 4 and 8 hours after aerobic exercise, and back to normal at 24 hours (Sporer and Wenger). |
| On a rest day | Then it is not a rest day. A rest day has nothing on it. | A 2026 review found indoor cycling consistently associated with high-intensity demand (Becerra-Patiño); a stationary bike class rates 9.0 METs, inside the vigorous band (2024 Adult Compendium). |
The same question for a reformer class is answered in reformer Pilates and weights, and the common group classes are rated as strength, cardio or easy in classes. Every pairing is in crossovers.
Your class counts as training
Add your indoor cycling class under You: in SPORTS STACK, tap + ADD and find it under GROUP CLASSES. A class is a session someone else has already programmed: it counts as training you have done, so with Pro or during your trial your coach adjusts what it gives you instead of adding on top. A class starts on Fixed days, because a timetable decides when it happens, so you pick the days yours runs before you save. More in add a sport or a class.
In the class's settings, Coach warm-up and cool-down offers a short activation routine to do before a group class, written by your coach with Pro or during your trial. See sport settings.
Moved a session to fit a new class time? A session you move stays where you put it: it becomes yours, and with Pro or during your trial your coach plans around it. See move, copy or delete a session. If you want the week rebalanced around a change, ask your coach in chat, with Pro or during your trial. It already knows your week, and nothing changes until you tap Confirm on the card it shows you. See what you can ask and apply a change from chat.
Exercises are shown as clean illustrations: the movement on a plain background, with nothing extra, so you see what to do at a glance. The team is exploring video and moving images. More in Exercise illustrations.