Week in Review–April 7th, 2012

The Week in Review is a collection of both all the goodness I’ve written during the past week around the internet, as well as a small pile of links I found interesting – generally endurance sports related. I’ve often wondered what to do with all of the coolness that people write, and while I share a lot of it on Twitter, Facebook, and Google Plus, this is a better forum for sending it on to y’all. Most times these different streams don’t overlap, so be on the lookout at all these places for good stuff!

So with that, let’s get into the action!

DCRainmaker.com posts this past week:
Here’s all the goodness that ended up on the main page of DCRainmaker.com this week:

Saturday: Week in Review–March 31st, 2012
Sunday: Ironman Texas 70.3–The Day Before In Photos
Monday: Ironman Texas 70.3–Race Day
Tuesday: Suunto Ambit In-Depth Review
Wednesday: Weekend Tidbits- Running with Chris Lieto, shooting with the pros, and a DSLR tethered iPhone
Thursday: Garmin, Suunto and Polar want your feedback (directly)
Friday: Question of the day- Triathlon and Running Clubs

Slowtwitch Mailbag post:
I’m returning to a slightly different schedule for Slowtwitch – roughly once a month, maybe more often here and there, but we’ll just take it as it goes.  Here’s all the goodness I covered this week:

1) Thoughts on the newly available Suunto Ambit
2) Is the Garmin GTU-10 the best tracking device today for endurance racing?
3) Comparing the CycleOps PowerBeam Pro to Tacx Bushido

You can enjoy that by simply clicking right on over to the mailbag.

Stuff that I found interesting around the interwebs:
Here’s a not-so-small smattering of all the random things that I stumbled on while doing my civic duty to find the end of the Internet:

1) The secret life of swimmers: A pretty cool piece posted to CNN with a gallery of swimmers contrasting photos in their day jobs with ones at the pool.

2) The 10 Best Bike Parties: It’s official, I’m going to work my way through this list…somehow, someway.  Fun stuff.

3) Nike Commercial – I would Run to you: I saw during American Idol this past week, but what’s more amazing is that they played the full 2 minutes and 30 seconds during prime time TV.  Crazy!  Awesome commercial, addicting song.

Nike Free: I would run to you

4) A bike camper – yes, seriously:  If this isn’t the pinnacle of cross-country bike trekking, I don’t know what is.

5) Watch Capital Bikeshare Trips as little moving dots: Pretty cool animation using location data showing all the trips taken on a given Sunday.  Just imagine what it would look like in the summer…

6) This is what ultra runners do in the winter: Crazy awesome sledding track that this top ultra runner put together in ‘his spare time’.  After watching this, I’m quitting triathlon and going ultra – but only for the off seasons. (Thanks Clark!)

7) Top scientist quits anti-doping organization: There’s been all sorts of buzz about this over the course of the week.  Worth a read to catch up and understand the issue.

8) Photos of DC sports event with First Lady Obama and Vasa Swim Trainers: Figuring that I’ve still got one of these sitting downstairs next to my bike trainers, I thought this was pretty cool and interesting.   I mentioned the event a few weeks ago – but here’s a ton of high res photos.  Oh, and the wife of British Prime Minister David Cameron was hanging out there too!

9) 9 Important Reasons You Shouldn’t Bike to Work: As we get closer to Bike to Work Day here in the DC region (and across much of the US), this is oddly appropriate. Oh, and for you folks who bike to work every day, yes, Bike to Work Day is more of a ‘get out the troops’ day than the only day one bikes to work.  On Bike to Work Day (May 18th), I’ll pass by 5 official pit stops.  Crazy! Oddly enough, assuming it doesn’t dump on Monday, I’ll be making the  25 mile trek to work (each direction).  Good times…

10) Just a perfectly appropriate Instagram photo: Hilarious photo of what I suspect is an Ironman Texas 70.3 athlete on a ride the day before, taking a picture on his cell phone while kitted out and still cycling.  Who was he trying to capture mid-ride?  Well, you can guess…

Sports Technology Software/Firmware Updates This Week:

I’m going to try something new where I quickly highlight some of the new firmware, app, software and website updates that I see go out, each week. If you’re a sports technology company and release an update – shoot me a quick note (just one liners) and I’ll make mention of it here. Sound good?

TrainingPeaks does fairly significant redesign of Quickview, adds PMC planning, more history options

Zeo updates iPhone App, fixes some bugs

With spring break for many here in the US, it was a pretty quiet week on the sports app/firmware/updates front.

With that – have a great weekend all!  And don’t eat the heads off too many chocolate bunnies!

FOUND THIS POST USEFUL? SUPPORT THE SITE!

Hopefully, you found this post useful. The website is really a labor of love, so please consider becoming a DC RAINMAKER Supporter. This gets you an ad-free experience, and access to our (mostly) bi-monthly behind-the-scenes video series of “Shed Talkin’”.

Support DCRainMaker - Shop on Amazon

Otherwise, perhaps consider using the below link if shopping on Amazon. As an Amazon Associate, I earn from qualifying purchases. It doesn’t cost you anything extra, but your purchases help support this website a lot. It could simply be buying toilet paper, or this pizza oven we use and love.