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:
Alternatively, for everything else on the planet, simply buy your goods from Amazon via the link below and I get a tiny bit back as an Amazon Associate. No cost to you, easy as pie!
You can use the above link for any Amazon country and it (should) automatically redirect to your local Amazon site.
-
Check out my weekly podcast - with DesFit, which is packed with both gadget and non-gadget goodness!
-
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.
This is really interesting news Ray. I recently ditched my Polar CS600X in favor of Wahoo’s SC and HR sensors, but have been feeling a bit uncomfortable with mounting my iPhone on the (semi-) aero frame of my Venge. Also, on a recent 95 mile ride I ran out of Apple juice about half way – and was actually considering adding more bulk in the form of an external battery. Wahoo’s external display would solve all these problems at once.
Tks Ray for the review. Tons of news in the sport industry, hard to keep up without you!
So if it could be a replacement for the Garmin, it relies on the Iphone gps. You may have cover it before but how good is the iphone in terms of gps accuracy?
Know if there will be any compatibility with the pebble? Maybe the pebble could also be used as an external display but guessing not as that would cut into their profits
This is a potential Garmin-killer (why have an expensive garmin, while you can gear up your iphone with the rflkt for 100 bucks with more options?).
In my opinion there are 2 critical success factors the rflkt has to challenge:
1. It needs to lengthen the battery time of a iphone to more than 10 hours.
2. It should transfer more than only simple data. Like maps and live data from the interwebs. If so, app-programmers can finally make an app for the rflkt with “find your friend-function”, “rainradar-function” and “find the strava-segment-function”.
And yes, than i will ditch my android for an iphone.
Oooooh that would be awesome in a watch-like package for running… (Yes, I know, Pebble should do something similar…)
This product is awesome for training rides and recreational riders. However I believe USAT and WTC don’t allow cell phones in races (don’t know about road race rules). This means that if you want data durring a race your still getting a garmin, polar, etc.
They should develop a wrist mount for it also. Then you also have a running watch with the right apps. Might be easier than checking a phone in your pocket or on an armband.
Except info. from the Wahoo Fitness app and the CycleMeter app , would it also be able to notify me about incoming call , SMS or eMail ?
Between $100 for this and $50 for the ant+ receiver for the phone you’re already most of the way to an Edge 500. Sounds like a great idea, but just too expensive.
Hi Anon-
Yup, it could if the application programmed that – but the app developer would have to accommodate that. I’ll check with both teams and see if there’s something like that in there today.
Hi Bugsy-
Actually, USAT and WTC do allow cell phones in race use. However, if you make two-way communication (inbound), the rules state you must pull over and not make forward progress.
I’ve had long discussions with the head USAT ref about the rule. Regrettably, for the life of me I can’t seem to get them to actually externally document it. Not for lack of trying however.
It’s a battle I eventually intend on winning…I just want them to document what they’ve already decided and semi-communicated.
Interesting product — hate the name… What’s with Wahoo and vowel-less product names (KICKR, RFLKT)? Not a fan of that trend…
Could you get a picture of the forward mount?
Very interesting, thanks for the information!
This is a really nice development, especially because it shows what is possible with Bluetooth Smart. This is quite innovative stuff.
I would almost dump the Garmin Edge 705 as head unit. However, the Garmin still does a great job at displaying courses on its maps. I’m using BikeRouteToaster to create a courses and put it on the Garmin Edge – works great.
Hi Ray,
Started reading your blog a few weeks ago and love, love, LOVE it! What a terrific resource.
Regarding GPS – and in response to Vivelevelo’s post, I’ve been playing around with an Emprum GPS chipset that plugs into my iPhone 4 – great for when I am riding in Contra Costa county where cellphone reception/GPS on my iPhone is patchy at best and often non-existent. Of course, it means that I can’t plug in a Wahoo bluetooth adaptor to pick up HR/speed+cadence sensors. But, as you say somewhere else on your blog, in 12 months, all new smartphones will have BT 4.0 and will be able to hook up to a wide range of sensors.
Anyway, curious to get your thoughts (if any) on using an external GPS adaptor on the bike for where GPS might be sub-standard in a smartphone. The above setup seems like it might work well with this device too.
Thanks,
Will.
May I ask the scenario of swap battery per 18 months ?
I would like the newly proposed version that will work with my simple iPhone 4. I hope they produce both versions. Thanks Ray, for the great review and site.
Iphone 4 doesn’t have the chip for Bluetooth 4.0. Looks like we might be out of luck.
Hi Inner-
RE: Vowel-less
I was fine with the KICKR, since that was sorta cute. But I agree tehRFLKT is just a mess to spell. :(
Hi Unknown-
RE: Forward mount
Yup, sorry, I added it a few hours after your request, just forgot to note it. Thanks!
Hi StGeorge-
RE: External GPS
Indeed, there’s been talk about external GPS pods (both ANT+ and BTLE). I suspect you’ll see one come out on BTLE before ANT+, primarily to do exactly what you said.
Hi Anon-
RE: Battery in 18 months
It’s just a coin cell, so simply swapping it out will take unscrewing the back and then plopping a new one in. Most drug stores have them for $3-5. Online for about 10 for $5-10.
Hi Bob/Anon-
RE: iPhone 4
Unfortunately, Anon is correct, the original iPhone 4 doesn’t have Bluetooth 4.0 in it, and thus can’t communicate with BTLE/BLE/Bluetooth Smart devices like this. IU don’t see anything changing in that department since the costs involved in creating an adapter are a bit high (plus, battery issues). Sorry!
Just wondering if the RFLKT has any sort of backlight facility – seems a killer product but won’t suit me unless it works in the dark!
Ray….reference the external GPS
There actually already is a BlueTooth GPS for the iphone.
link to bad-elf.com
It mostly marketed to the aviation community, but if you look at their websites list of compatible apps, there are quite a few fitness apps that work with it. The same company also make a dongle GPS for the iPhone.
Has there been any talk of showing distance to next turn and turn by turn directions on the RFLKT?
Yeah, it is regular BT however, and not BT4.0 thus not Bluetooth Smart (Bluetooth Low Energy) – which is the key to getting the data in sport-like devices.
I think we’ll see lots of stuff like turn by turn end up on RFLKT, no doubt by spring.
This technology is moving so fast you’re gonna need some sort of device to pace yourself so we don’t lose you to burn out. Keep up the good work.
Can you elaborate more on the differences between ANT+ and Bluetooth Smart – i.e. difference in battery consumption, signal reliability, is ANT+ going obsolete, etc…?
Hi RTO-
This post should help a bit. I wrote it last summer, and some of the products out there have changed slightly, but the fundamentals of everything else and where the technology is at is the same:
link to dcrainmaker.com
I’ll probably write an update in two weeks, following CES2013.
Enjoy!
Well here we are at CES 2013! Can’t wait for an update on this product and how well it will interact with the hrm and cadence. I’m holding off on getting a Garmin.
Any updates on the Wahoo Fitness RFLKT bike computer?
link to dcrainmaker.com
I’ve been waiting patiently. When is this coming?
They’ve publicly promised to give an update by the “end of the week” (per their FB page).
I hope the display is more customizable. Need at least heart rate, speed, cadence and distance on the screen simultaneously without having to push buttons.
Yup, it’s a ton more customizable than the screens above. The latest version of the app released last week helps that a ton.
RFLKT is finally available to order on the Wahoo Fitness Web Site for $129.95. Cant wait to switch. My Garmin Premium Heart Rate strap started acting up again yesterday (reading 1/2 what it should) so I have had enough of Ant+. This is my 4th Garmin Strap to fail in 18 months. Even though Garmin has been replacing them for free I’m switching to a full Wahoo Bluetooth setup.
If I buy the RFLKT now.. and the turn by turn navigation comes later this years. Can my ‘older’ RFLKT also been used for the new features?
Still no confirmation on backlight – the sole user review on the Wahoo site seems to say that it has that facility but it isn’t listed in the specs in the store. Confused and waiting for a full independent review before ordering as it is a “make or break” feature for me – too much commuting in the dark in my life!
Wahoo Fitness posted this response to the backlight question on Facebook:
“Yes it does have a backlight, although leaving the backlight on greatly reduces the battery life, but you still have the choice.”
Cheers, must be time to order one then!
So how is it going to do power Ray if the iPhone 4s and 5 only use Bluetooth Smart? Is there a Bluetooth power meter out there for a standard road bike that we haven’t heard about yet?
There’s a variety of ANT+ adapters available for the 4S that will allow the phone to take in data from multiple sensors and just dump that data out to the RFLKT unit over Bluetooth Smart. The RFLKT is just a “dumb terminal” and (as far as I know) doesn’t talk to the sensors directly. There was talk of another version which would act as an ANT+ bridge to send ANT + data to the phone over BT smart and then send it back to RFLKT for display – it may have been just a rumour though!
The Stages Power Meter is Bluetooth Smart (and works with the app, as it follows the Bluetooth Smart device profile). It started shipping about two weeks ago.
Additionally, the Wahoo KICKR and Kinetic inRIDE are also Bluetooth Smart power meters, and transmit identically to that of the Stages PM.
For ANT+ devices, it’s as Niall noted. You can route via the Wahoo Adapter to the Wahoo App (for ANT+), or, down the road they’ll be also offering a RFLKT ANT+ variant.
I have my new RFLKT attached to my bike. Works great. It came attached to the “handlebar” mount. After a little struggling, I was able to figure out how to separate the RFLKT from the handlebar mount. The RFLKT made a sharp click when I inserted it into the “stem” mount. I have not been able to figure out how to separate the RFLKT from the stem mount. I guess I have 18 months to figure it out before the battery dies.
There is a shiny silver piece of metal included in the RFLKT box in a plastic bag. This is used to remove the RFLKT from the mount.
Thanks. I got it figured out. A YouTube video helped as well. I am accustomed to putting screwdriver heads into slots and applying a twisting motion in order to separate things. This is not the correct motion for the RFLKT. You put the shiny metal bar (or a screw driver) into the slot at the top of the RFLKT and apply a front-to-back pressure. Only a very small amount of force is required to separate the RFLKT from the stem mount.
I am still struggling with the choice between the Garmin Edge 510 bundle or this Wahoo RFLKT. If I look hard enough, can get the Garmin bundle for $350. If I get RFLKT + the sensors, it is around $280. I already own an iPhone 5 and I think I would likely carry it with me regardless of what head unit I end up getting. So the costs are somewhat comparable especially since RFLKT does not yet have any direct compatibility with 3rd party Apps and even Cyclemeter is close but there is no guarantee on timing for others. Especially since the install base is low. What would you guys do?
I´m gonna wait for wahoo to come up with the iphone 5 case. in the mean time, gonna use a frame bag with a front bag for the phone.
The new 510/810 do not work correctly with power meters if you use one. To date they won’t say when they will have a fix. I’ve been having a hard time trying to return my 810… If you get a Garmin I’d suggest the 500/800 as those work correctly. Be sure to check forums.garmin.com though, you’ll see all the issues with the new 510/810. It is almost like these are the first cycling products ever made by Garmin, definitely a huge disappointment.
Here is the direct link to RFLKT compatible apps: link to wahoofitness.com
As of late Feb. there are two apps supporting RFLKT: the Wahoo Fitness app and iMobileIntervals (link to imobileintervals.com).
iMobileIntervals RFLKT display has HR, watts, speed, cadence, total elapsed and interval/lap times, current music selection or current/next interval activity, and live data telemetry status. iMobileIntervals also has control from the four hardware buttons on the RFLKT to pause/skip music, toggle backlight, restart the interval workout, skip forward/backward the interval, or take a lap split.
Does anyone know when the turn by turn will be implemented and if so will it come to the current model or will you have to update the whole unit!! I’m seriously considering getting this unit but i also worry about the accuracy of the speed as i doubt the iphone has a comparable chip to the Garmin’s. One advantage for me would be the ability to connect my rides to Strava.
Great Blog and reviews. Thanks.
Any experience on how the bluetooth signals and gps pick up are for the cell phone when its in a saddle bag? Im thinking this is a great way to protect the phone while MTBing but worried the BT signal isnt strong enough.
Any update on how the turn-by-turn navigation is going?
TURN-BY-TURN NAVIGATION ON WAHOO RFLKT AND RFLKT+ BIKE COMPUTERS
link to wahoofitness.com
Hello,
I’d be interested to know if the unit could be used to show data fields from a GPS watch e.g. a Suunto Spartan or a Garming FR935, since it uses an optical HR sensor now.
It can’t directly talk to any of those units from a data field perspective.
But it could receive HR if broadcasted from a Garmin unit (Suunto doesn’t re-broadcast HR).