Heads up! Here’s your massive list of sports tech deals! This includes the Garmin Forerunner 965 for just $499, Garmin Epix for $429, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 Black Titanium for $735, the GoPro Hero 12 Black for $299, (or Hero 13 bundle for $339!) and plenty more! Go check out the full list here!
I’m DC RAINMAKER…
Here’s how to save!
Wanna save some cash and support the site? These companies help support the site! With Backcountry.com or Competitive Cyclist with either the coupon code DCRAINMAKER for first time users saving 15% on applicable products.
You can also pick-up tons of gear at REI via these links, which is a long-time supporter as well:
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You can use the above link for any Amazon country and it (should) automatically redirect to your local Amazon site.
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5 Easy Steps To The Site
1
In Depth Product Reviews
You probably stumbled upon here looking for a review of a sports gadget. If you’re trying to decide which unit to buy – check out my in-depth reviews section. Some reviews are over 60 pages long when printed out, with hundreds of photos! I aim to leave no stone unturned.
2
Read My Sports Gadget Recommendations.
Here’s my most recent GPS watch guide here, and cycling GPS computers here. Plus there are smart trainers here, all in these guides cover almost every category of sports gadgets out there. Looking for the equipment I use day-to-day? I also just put together my complete ‘Gear I Use’ equipment list, from swim to bike to run and everything in between (plus a few extra things). And to compliment that, here’s The Girl’s (my wife’s) list. Enjoy, and thanks for stopping by!
3
Have some fun in the travel section.
I travel a fair bit, both for work and for fun. Here’s a bunch of random trip reports and daily trip-logs that I’ve put together and posted. I’ve sorted it all by world geography, in an attempt to make it easy to figure out where I’ve been.
4
My Photography Gear: The Cameras/Drones/Action Cams I Use Daily
The most common question I receive outside of the “what’s the best GPS watch for me” variant, are photography-esq based. So in efforts to combat the amount of emails I need to sort through on a daily basis, I’ve complied this “My Photography Gear” post for your curious minds (including drones & action cams!)! It’s a nice break from the day-to-day sports-tech talk, and I hope you get something out of it!
5
The Swim/Bike/Run Gear I Use List
Many readers stumble into my website in search of information on the latest and greatest sports tech products. But at the end of the day, you might just be wondering “What does Ray use when not testing new products?”. So here is the most up to date list of products I like and fit the bill for me and my training needs best! DC Rainmaker 2023 swim, bike, run, and general gear list. But wait, are you a female and feel like these things might not apply to you? If that’s the case (but certainly not saying my choices aren’t good for women), and you just want to see a different gear junkies “picks”, check out The Girl’s Gear Guide too.
I think my most memorable Easter Story would be when I was around 7 or 8 years old. My mom would hide eggs each year and this time I couldn’t find the final egg…and of course my mom couldn’t remember where she hide them all!
So a few months later, we found the offending egg buried behind some old books on the bookcase! That took FOREVER to get the stink out of the house.
I plan to start running again after recovering from my first ultra marathon. Probably 13 – 17 slow miles.
I thought an egg would be hiding inside a box in the back yard. But it wasn’t an egg. The rain unearthed a shoebox where my childhood dog was buried in the back yard. Oh, not a great Easter Day that was.
Really enjoy your blog and would love to win the new Garmin! For Easter I plan to do 3 miles at most. Mostly relax and hang out with my wife and boys and just enjoy them all day!
Easter plans are to head to the parents and in-laws. Planning do a 18km on Sunday with Dad-in-law, hubby, our tri-training buddy. May try to get a weights and step class in with my Mom-in-law too on Sat (just so she doesn’t feel left out of the celebrations). Then it’s 2 family Easter dinners!!
Plan on heading home after a 4 month tour in the middle east. Booya.
Headed to Amsterdam for vacay this Friday. May get funny easter stories trying to get into a church there on Sunday. Hoping to get in a long run, and to find a pool for a quick swim.
While visiting my grandparents in south Florida, my sister and I were hiding easter eggs. The real boiled and dyed kind. I place one on the fireplace mantel (yes, even in Florida) and it fell into some sort of hole and I couldn’t reach it. Instead of telling an adult, I just left it there. I can just imagine once that egg, which probably cracked when it fell, started to smell and no one would know what was the cause. Ew!
I’m going to do some trail runs. 10 miles on saturday and probably 15-20 on sunday. Recovering from my first ultra marathon, so taking it easy.
Ha! I am inspired to make a funny Easter story. I may challenge my sister and fellow runner, to a Running of the Peeps challenge, where the first person to the checkpoint gets marshmallow-y goodness.
Will be eating chocolate Je
I have kids. We have an Easter egg hunt around the yard every year. I find old plastic eggs around the garden all year. Any now way is anyone eating those things!
Ramping up the training for Hawaii 70.3 and doing 70 mile ride followed by 10 mile run. Easter recovery will require lots of dark chocolate and peanut butter cups!
40 mile ride Friday, 8 mile run Saturday, followed by Easter activities in the afternoon.
Nice giveaway Ray…thanks!
Our funny Easter story is this year, where when we opened the Easter supplies bin – all of the baskets still had candy in them from last year.
What can I say, my wife likes to put stuff away, even if you’re not done using it. It makes dinner parties awkward :)
Hope I’ll win
Hopefully I can do a 6-8mi run on Saturday. Gearing up for a Fall marathon. Right now recovering from a mild cold, but hoping to shake it off by the weekend.
I grew up in Southeast Louisiana. One Easter morning, my uncle hit a duck with his truck, got stuck in the side mirror. He rung its neck on the side of the road. We at that duck later that day.
Happy Easter, and good luck to all!
My plan is to keep working on my 5K run walk program. Easter will be the start of week four of a nine week program. My goal is to be in a Marathon 1 year from now. This would be an amazing tool for the next year.
I will be getting the last vertical feet of the ski season – before I then focus on rebuilding the running base that I’ve neglected all season!
12 miles HMP+20… maybe I’ll add on a couple miles so I can eat some more Easter candy!
I plan to tandem bike “commute” to my dad’s house for Easter.
Hopefully I can do a 6-8mi run on Saturday. Gearing up for a Fall marathon. Right now recovering from a mild cold, but hoping to shake it off by the weekend.
planned workout is a long run and cross training with a double header ball game. Oh and running to the games and back for extra insult and junk miles.
Here’s hoping for the best… Thanks for all the great reviews, advice, and articles!
running the Cleveland 10-miler on Saturday :-)
really excited about it!
I think the most famed Easter Egg Hunt lore is when my father (err…Easter bunny), known for incredibly creative and difficult hiding of eggs, actually had to write down, by room, where the eggs were hidden. Otherwise we were likely to be searching until after dark. It’s a family tradition I’m sure my sister and I will carry on!
Thanks for such a generous offer!
No funny stories here but I am running a nine mile progression run on Saturday. Not too long but I’m a ways out from SF marathon.
Love the site and all the good info.
Celebrating Easter in Houston with family,… and no snow… and temps above 40… and lots of running. Resurrection of the soul.
I can’t wait to eat eat Easter candy and hope to win an FR 610 in the meantime. Sounds like a perfect weekend plan.
Eating Easter dinner and my little cousin looked out the window in the dining room to see a rabbit sitting in the side yard. She completely freaked out. To this day (15 years later) we all still talk about the year we saw the ‘real’ Easter Bunny during dinner. :)
Thanks for the contest! Love your site!
Finding plastic eggs stolen by the resident wildlife on the local trails about a mile from the field where the egg hunt is held all throughout last May.
Looking forward to the first legit ride of the year following the Boston Marathon!
So about a week after Easter, my 2 year old son, who does not talk much, had gotten into his closet and drawn on the shelves and walls with crayon. We said, “WHAT HAPPENED? WHO DID THIS?”. He blamed it on the Easter Bunny, “The Easter Bunny did it.” I can’t believe the bouncing one actually leaves him a basket every year after being thrown under the bus like that…
Planned Workout: Quick 5k run on Saturday followed by many laps around Hains Point on the bike Sunday. With lots of rest and packing before a travel week for work.
Two runs and a charity bike ride event with my 23 month old son.
One year at Easter while we were chatting in the living room after dinner, my brother’s dog managed to get up on the table and eat the entire remains of our Easter ham. We thought he was going to die. Not funny at the time, but now it’s a favorite Easter story.
Feeling lucky today…
saturday morning race followed by a sunday afternoon ride (if the weather holds up)!
We hide plastic eggs filled with candy around the house for the kids to find, and my then-six-year-old daughter was so enamored of this that she spent the next week re-hiding and finding the eggs. We finally got tired of having plastic egg halves strewn around the house and had her collect them all in a bucket to put away until the next year. The next year my wife and I sat down to fill the plastic eggs with candy while watching a movie. After a while my wife commented that I was putting the filled eggs back in the bucket with the empty ones. I denied this, and after a bit of investigation we figured out that my daughter, the year before, had wanted to recreate the egg hunt so completely that she had refilled the eggs with her brother’s easter candy, a fact we hadn’t caught before we put the eggs away for the year.
Growing up my parents always got me chocolate Easter bunnies for Easter, but I couldn’t make myself eat something with a big smiling face on it. So, I just stashed them in my closet. When I moved off to college my parents went through my room cleaning everything out and stumbled on 10-11 year of stashed chocolate rabbits. A few of them were even white (but they didn’t start out that way).
Heartbreak Hill Brick. Should be free of marathoners.
Dad always hid the eggs. The rule was they would be in plain sight. Still were always insanely hard to find. He had to track where he put them to avoid lost egg syndrome.
I’m always in for give away. Thanks!
Yeah, I am a sucker for new toys. May be this will motivate me to run regularly :)
Another recovery 4 mile run as I try to get over patellar tendonitis.
This would look really good on my arm at my HM on 5/7!
Planned workout this week, chillax!
Last year the “Easter Bunny” put the eggs out early AM, but an industrious squirrel stole most and stashed them way up in a tree before we noticed. Our small kids now think the Bunny has a wicked side — cruelly hiding eggs out of reach, and all.
My daily workout: sleep 4 hours because of my 3 kids (Sam, Laura,Iván – that is really my daily triathlon ;) and after that 1 hour of swimming pool at 7am, go to work, lunch break with no lunch but 4×1000@4m10km+stretching and some evening cycleops watts at home (6x4min@300watts, 2 min recover in between)…
And easter will be the same, without work ;) bsaically with 3 kids everyday is groundhog day ;-b
and… sure: lots of swiss chocolate bunnies: living in EU has a few advantages like having the best chocolate everywhere!
Thanks and hugs,
Sam
Planning on doing some WW Kayaking basic skills review and drills on Friday. Kayaking a river on Saturday afternoon, and then rafting a local river on Easter Monday to finish off the great weekend!
Not a super funny Easter incident but I started riding bike in 1st week of feb after 15 yes or so, I did 860 miles so far and am training for STP in one day. This weekend I am doing 80 miles on Saturday and 40 on Sunday. Yay! SO much fun.
I love the blog, very informative and a great inspiration.
Did a nice 70 mile last weekend and will do this weekend for training to cycle the UK coast to coast :)
Have a happy easter
Chris
For Easter weekend, I plan to run 20 miles in preparation for my May marathon. I hope this snow stops soon…
Plan to have fun with family and friends, and I hope I don’t drink too much the night before. That’s when I forget where I hid the easter eggs…and months later, I find my son eating hard candy at 5am!!
The sun is supposed to shine all weekend, so we are planning on a couple of loooong rides on the fun bikes this weekend!
I plan to run 6 miles on Saturday. THen pig out on ham, rolls and all the fixins on Sunday!
As for a funny Easter Story…hmmm…not too funny, but at my grandma’s house we always had to find ALL of the eggs with our name on them before we could have our Easter Basket, and this would often take hours. The first year I brought my husband to the festivities, my husband could not find his last egg…we looked and looked and it was just not to be found…We are quite certain that my cousin’s son (who happens to have the same name as my husband) walked away with his last egg, but for a long time we were searching for that final egg..My husband can’t seem to forget the event and being forced to keep looking for hours!
I would really love to win this as my birthday IS May 6th…the day it is released..that is some extra good luck right?
When I was 7 or 8, I left my Easter basket full of candy out and we came back from church and the dogs had eaten ALL my jelly beans, cookies, etc…luckily I had already eaten the chocolate. I’m pretty sure my parents were ready to kill me.
Saturday easy bike ride and short run on Sunday. Thanks for the giveaway.
Plan to fill a hollow, chocolate bunny with crunchy peanut butter, eat it all and probably make myself sick.
bradjrollins@yahoo.com
just planning on some easy maintenance runs and chaseing the kids (spring break)
No big plans…
I am for it.
I plan to do an epic 110km, 1700m vertical bike ride on what feels like not enough training…
highly appreciate all your product reviews.
as i build my base to do sub-40 10K this winter, i would love to have one of those. thanks!
90 minute bike 60 minute run brick on Sunday.
Easter plans include 1000 yd. TT in the pool on Sat. and an easy run after all the eggy-churchy goodness calms down.
Have a great week and keep up the great blogging!
I am stuck with a Data Center maintenance work this days, but if all goes well I will go out for a bike ride this weekend.
Oddly enough I’m going to easter church on Saturday night then hitt’n the Columbia Gorge for some good trail running on easter its self.
Easter plans are to carry on riding daily.
I like the form factor of this watch. I wonder how the touch screen will hold up, though. Thanks for posting about it!
I have a 12mile run planned for saturday with a 20 min bike cool down. Sunday Morning i will probably sit on the bike trainer for an hour.
Goal this weekend:
8 x :30 @ 500watts.
I’ll have a bucket nearby.
ben.feinebrg@gmail.com
I NEED GPS!!!!
First tri of the year was on Sunday. 43 degrees with 20mph winds. The bike leg was cold.
Count on me for the giveaway.
Unfortunately, my planned workout this weekend is resting my sore IT band. Boo.
My favorite funny Easter memory is the time I won a Garmin 610 with heartstrap in a dcrainmaker giveway. Oh good times, good times! What, that didn’t really happen? And it isn’t funny?
Oh, in that case it has to be finding the unfound eggs weeks or months later by their smell. When you’re a kid anything involving bad smells is mega-funny.
What a coincidence I was just thinking yesterday is it time for me to transition froim polar to garmin? Hmmm….
Pick me! Please.
It must have been around the time I was 6-7 years old. Got up in the middle of the night for a pre-dawn easter egg hunt to ensure I got the best eggs. Parents found me in the morning, passed out in the living room covered in chocolate and empty wrappers.
I really wish I had some fun easter stories. But alas, I’m just planning on running a quick 13 miles and then going to town on some peeps. Thanks for the contest!!!
My girls like to play/hide the plastic eggs year round so I end up finding them in places I never thought they’d fit!
Awesome giveaway. I am sure there will be MANY people entering so congrats to who ever wins!
Best Regards!
Jason
When I was a kid, we used to hunt eggs at my grandparents. There as always one hidden under my grandfather’s hat.
Nice long 22 miler this weekend…
Hope I am the lucky guy to get this beauty.
I’ll be out for a long ride and run on the Olympic Penninsula! Yay for good weather!
And I’ll be watching my kids chase around some little chicks around the coup.
Doing 11 miles this weekend, weather is better on Sunday so decisions decisions!
My workout will consist of hiding 1,000 eggs on Sunday morning (my workplace sponsors an Easter egg hunt), and supervising scores of children in the mad dash to find them all. Then, it’s off to the trail for a 5-mile run, followed by a series of push-ups and sit-ups!
Hi Ray, no funny Easter stories to tell but I will no doubt bolster the choc milk post training drink with some of the solid variety. Have a great break. Gareth
Big workouts on tap. 4 hour ride one day, double-digit run the next. Happy Easter!
Am in grad school and it’s the end of the semester so my workout will be the walk from my place to the school’s library (about 1.5 miles) and typing….lots and lots of typing. Does that count?
Hid a hard boiled egg inside a plastic egg shell and found it after a year. It was gross inside and not to mention how yucky the smell was. Ewwww.
On the easter weekend I planned to do my long run (35 km) but instead I got sick. Now I am not even able to get out of my bed.
I’m going to Huaraz to accompany some people during the celebrations! On Sunday I have planned my long run!
Easter was a big deal in my house (not unlike another commenter’s Eastmas). Every year, we got a new animal to try and raise — bunnies, ducklings, one year it was a baby squirrel my dad rescued. Did you know baby squirrels love Froot Loops? It’s true! Sadly, none of the animals left in our charge lasted until the next Easter…
Easter Sunday is one week prior to my first tri of the season (Wildflower), so I’m looking forward to a nice and easy ride as part of my taper.
Hook a brother up!
Not a funny story but can not wait for some starburst jelly beans.
as a kid at an Easter egg hunt, there were golden eggs hidden with a prize of a real bunny. Before the hunt started my friends went out to find the gold eggs and move them to a place only they would know. At the start of the hunt they ran to there golden eggs and returned to get there live bunny’s. When showing there parent the prize, one father was not happy about the new pet and gave him the choice of giving up the bunny or having rabbet stew for dinner… yum
I’m afraid i don’t have a good easter story! Did my first tri (sprint) on the 17th and am super pumped to do more!
Doing a 90min ride today and 45min run.