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There are plenty of fitness facilities where you can reenergize your body. But what about renewing your soul?

That’s the idea behind Revolution Indoor Cycling, a fitness studio recently opened by Amanda Moses, ’09, and two of her friends, Rachel McCrone and Colleen Kirk. The three women envision the center to be one where people can work out, make friends, and do something good for their community.

“When we were putting together our business plan, we wanted to think of something that made us different in terms of what we offer past the workout,” Amanda explains.

What they came up with was RevCommunity Rides, a once-a-month spinning class followed by a community service project. The Saturday-morning class is free for participants who agree to volunteer at a Buffalo-area nonprofit organization for a few hours afterward. The inaugural “ride” was held in January and followed by a cleanup project at Ronald McDonald House. Future projects are being planned at Habitat for Humanity and Grassroots Gardens.

“We want you to get everything,” Amanda says. “You leave the workout feeling better, looking better, and then you go out into the community and give back, which is a good thing for your mind as well.”

Amanda hopes that these kinds of events will appeal to people who are interested in community service but find it difficult to connect with an organization. “I know from experience that I like to volunteer, but it becomes a project just to find a place to go,” she says. “We thought that by doing this, it takes all the work out of volunteering. You know where you’re going because we put it together for you.”

Amanda, Rachel, and Colleen also hope that the rides will help to foster a sense of community and camaraderie among Revolution’s members.

“We were spending so much time at the gym that we became friends,” Amanda says, “and we want other people to make friends the same way. It’s such a good way to feel connected, and honestly, to me, that’s the most important thing to offer.”

It was this friendship and their commitment to fitness that inspired the women, who all hold full-time jobs, to open Revolution in the first place. “We were teaching at various place and spending so much time doing it that Rachel suggested we open our own studio. We thought, ‘We love it so much, why don’t we do it ourselves?’” Amanda says.

So last summer, they wrote a business plan for a fitness center that merged an active lifestyle, social engagement, and community good. In January, Revolution Indoor Cycling opened for business.

The studio offers spinning and TRX suspension-training classes Monday through Saturday. To make working out convenient for clients, shower towels, hairdryers, and toiletries are available. The women even take care of cleaning the equipment after each class.

Juggling the demands of their 9-5 jobs--Amanda is a senior accountant at Lumsden & McCormick, Rachel is a marketing specialist, and Colleen is a copywriter -- is challenging, Amanda admits.

“We pretty much just eat, sleep, and breathe our regular jobs and the studio,” she says. “But it’s our baby and we love it.”

The partners each spend about 10 hours per week in the studio and then devote another 15 hours or so on administrative tasks. But they find that the people who take their classes, especially the one at 5:45 a.m., motivate them to tackle their demanding schedules.

“It doesn’t feel like we’re burning ourselves out,” Amanda notes. “Our friends are coming to the studio and we’re making new friends, so we’re still getting to see people and feel social even though we’re working.”