Heads up! Here’s your massive list of sports tech deals! This includes the Garmin Forerunner 965 for just $499, Garmin Epix for $449, the Apple Watch Ultra 2 Black Titanium for $735, the GoPro Hero 12 Black for $299, 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.
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Check out my weekly podcast - with DesFit, which is packed with both gadget and non-gadget goodness!
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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.
A usual weekend + week start: 60k MTB yesterday (easier pace), 50k MTB today (quicker, but not super fast), 3k swimming / climbing in the evening, climbing / 3.5 swimming tomorrow…
My entry is for today. I’m gonna submit myself to something they call Caveman, which apparently is two hours of swinging ropes, hammering tractor tires, climbing ropes and the likes. We’ll see if I pull through =)
Start the first round of Yasso 800’s for OC Marathon training with 4 x 800 meters at a 7:50 pace.
easy 10K run, still recovering from a marathon last week.
Getting ready for IMCDA
Sunday Brick;
2500 yd Moderate Swim
3:30 Bike
:30 Run
Good times!
Boot camp class at 7:30 AM, then a 10 km run on the trails with two (damned fast) work colleagues if the rain doesn’t ruin it!
50K Tour of Anchorage ski tomorrow. Keepin it relaxed the first 30k, then pick it up if I’m feeling good.
2000 yard swim (freestyle, kick, pull, breast stroke interchanged)… no cramps in the deep end so the lifeguard doesn’t have to pull me out!
15min Warm-up
8km hard pace
15min recovery
Run 5 miles, training for SD RnR marathon!
10-20 minutes warmup
10x400w/1:30 RI
10 minutes cooldown
10km run
4 x 40 push ups
4 x 15 pull ups
4 x 15 leg raises (ankles up to bar)
All in 2 hour.
Easy, slow 5 mile run down the bike trail for about an hour. Then some fast pace walking back and forth, up and down the sections and aisles of Ikea.
Tempo Swim 2.2:
Set 1: 200m Z1 swim, Free and Back
Set 2: 2x50m Z1 Drill + 10sec
Set 3: 4x50m + 15sec building each 50m Z1-Z2-Z3-Z4.
Set 4: 1500 Z3 swim + 30sec
Set 5: 200m Z1 swim Free and Back
Use the 1500m rep to practice your pacing for your race. Visualise yourself swimming in the event.
warm-up
12x400m @ 4:10 min/km, rec 200m
coll down
This weekend a good skii session will be great :)
My purpose for tomorrow’s bike ride is to reach my aunt’s home riding for 62 km. I hope for a not windy morning. :P
Tomorrow I’m going to work by bike. 10 km is enough when you have a cold…
As soon as my cold is better I’m going out cross country skiing!
plan:
• Run in Z2, easy pace, 60 minutes.
• Run in Z3, half marathon pace, 30 minutes.
• Cool down, 5 to 10 minutes.
• Stretch
and the sun is comming out !
Going to run 90 minutes up and down a mountain, about 15K.
7 mile training run on 3/3 in prep for Tough Mudder – want to hit below a 9:00/mi pace.
I have spinning interval at 0630.
Way to kickstart your day.
Key 12 mile run Sunday. HM in 2 weeks and this will be my final “long” run before I start tapering. Looking to avg. 9:10 or so for this run.
90 minute workout using my Kinetic Trainer. Tempo training for improving race pace effort and increasing power output. 530am, a real daybreaker.
12 km. medium pace run around 4:00 min/km. 8 x 200 m. fast repetition intervals included at 3:00 min/km. Repetition intervals are done to get the legs ready for interval training later within the next few weeks, without getting to tired (I have primarily focused on long easy runs during the winter).
A six mile tempo run on a cool Georgia morning.
Post ACL surgery, 50 thigh contractions followed by 50 squeezing knees together with rolled towel between them. May follow with a hobble to the fridge.
Track workout:
1 mi warm up
4 x 1600 @ 9:38, with 2 min. rests btwn.
1 mi cool down
Tomorrow morning I am going to do my first recovery run since Tokyo Marathon last week. Probably 6-8 km slow and easy pace :)
I don’t have anything big planned. Probably a 40-50 minute run. I haven’t dipped my toes into the interval waters yet . . .
Today’s workout calls for 75 min on the bike. RPE 5/6 out of 10
I am going to do an interval running training next Tuesday. This time, it is going to be:
– 1 km warm-up
– 6×3 minutes (~5:00 min/km) with 2 minutes easy jog between
– 1 km cool-down
In addition to this weeks runs I have a 60 mile bike ride on the schedule. I’m traveling for work this week so I have the pleasure of exploring a new city (in this case Gainesville, FL) by bike. Looking forward to it!!!
Slow 12.5 km on sunday for steady buildup from 10k to half marathon distance.
15 minutes – Warm up (increasing intensity)
5 x (4min high intensity + 2min low intensity)
5 minutes cool down
A simple and short early season bike workout for building strength, trainer optional: 4×5′ in your biggest gear with 5′ recovery between each interval.
A simple 4 mile run on Saturday then a few pool sessions. Still in my offseason for a few more weeks so I want to enjoy it
Running: hill interval
15 minute warm up followed by light stretch
6 hill climbs. Each being minimum of 1 minute in length. Recover back down the hill.
You want all 6 climbs to be the same time. So pace properly.
15 minute warm down at the end.
Middle distance runner that is doing Dragon boat off season training with a 10k race around the corner:
monday:
1) 3 x1km run with ERG rowing machine for 3 minutes in between each run (targets: 3:30/km run split, and 1:50/500m erg split)
2) Weights
Tuesday (easy-ish run)
1) 9km run at 4:30/km pace
2) Body weight excercises
Wed
– Off
Thursday
1) 1) 3 x1km run with ERG rowing machine for 3 minutes in between each run (targets: 3:30/km run split, and 1:50/500m erg split)
2) Weights
Friday:
1)5km run 4:00/km split and 5km 4:30/km pace
2)Bodyweight excercises
Saturday:
1) Pool paddling practice
2) Circuit training.
Sunday:
-Rest.
Run 10k at race pace, ~8 min/mi.
Repeat the workout from yesterday:
Trail bike, five hours. Natural intervals looking for new trails to ride and picking up the best ones from before.
After a month and a half of forced immobility I’m slowly returning to running. This week I’ll build on the 30kms of the previous week following the 10% rule.
Next week I’ll start with more intense training with some hills.
Hi! My run plan.
Friday – 1 hour wide run
Saturday – 1 hour of acceleration
Sunday – or is more 2,5 hours endurance
My goal is to ski 20 km to get ready for couple of nordic marathons.
I’m working on my cycling skills so Thursday I’m doing a Spinervals series technique workout. Lots of one-legged pedaling which I hope will make my pedaling more rounded and efficient.
I’ve been neglecting my cycling training and hate riding the trainer. My goal or planned workout is to get at least 30 minutes on the trainer for 3 days next week.
Run 20km @ pace 6:40 min/km .
Take a long walk around the lake today.
Skate ski 20 km at 4 min / km pace, with hill repeats x 10. Then stairs x 1500. Feel the burn baby!
Skate ski 20 km at 4 min per km pace, with hill repeats times 10. Then stairs times 1500. Feel the burn baby!
Skate ski 20 km at a 4 min per km pace, followed by stairs times 1500 as quickly as possible. Still recovering from the American Birkebeiner. Feel the burn man.
Mine will be an easy 5 to 7k recovery run, after the Jerusalem Marathon on Friday.
Run for more than 21km. I am trainng for the Madrid Marathon and this is going to be my first time running more than the the half marathon distance.
So the plan is: Wake up at 7:00 am, have a breakfast, start at 08:00 am, run 24 km (more or less), have a shower and enjoy the rest of the day with my kids and wife…
Climb 10x 30″ on 30″ off
Monday, Wednesday, Friday: Cycle 25-35 miles plus 1 hour of swimming when the pools open
Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday: 2 hours of rock climbing
Sunday: Rest
Tuesday, 28km crosscountry skiing on intensity 4. Hoping sub 2 hours :)
Monday : easy run for 30′
Thursday : 10km with heart rate bellow 165 (hope in 60′)
12 mile hilly run. work the uphills easy downhills.
Training for my first sprint Triathlon later this month
Run – Swim – Run
4km – 1km – 4km
Easy run in the forrest! about 2h GA1 training.
Let the forest disover you :
2km to get to there, slow (little warm up).
Then repeat the following 6 times:
800m (1/2 mi) fast
45sec slow
But most important : if anything stikes you (beautiful bird, colorful trees, …); just take the most of it and enjoy : you will have another time to train harder.
Finally, 2km to get back home.
Stretch
This week, met 1 rabbit and 5 wild boars, last time some dears… because I learned to run quietly :-p
I’ll be running 10k in a loop along the Thames. No plan beyond running it as fast as possible and with a negative split.
2hr. Tempo ride today followed by a 3mile run with 3- strides before warm down…
Adding a little cross training to the mix with snowshoeing today.
I don’t know if there are any rowers on this website, so I thought I would lay down some real erging workouts because the ones I saw in the comments weren’t that great. (source: I rowed in high school for four years and won Stotesbury twice, once in the novice 8 and once in the Varsity B event), and rowed another four years in college and got second in the Dad Vail Freshman 8, second in the ACRA Varsity 8 twice, and third in the ECAC in the varsity 8 event)
Here is my entry (#1), and the rest are just for everyone else. Ray – maybe you can do a piece on ergs/rowing at some point? Only Concept2 ergs are really worth your time, but hey, its another great sport in my opinion, and a lot of rowers move to triathlon-type stuff after they finish rowing.
#1 (the entry) –
I would do this once a week.
1x1500m, one minute rest
1x500m, ten minutes rest
6x500m, one min rest in between each one.
For anyone that doesn’t know, the 2k is the standard race piece in rowing. It’s what they do at the olympics, college races, even some high school ones too.
This workout builds your 2k endurance by having you do 3/4 of a 2k, taking a short break just long enough for you to maybe catch your breath, and then crushing the last 1/4 of the 2k. Ideally you’re holding your pace on the 1500m part and then breaking past it on the 500m part. FYI, pace in rowing is per 500m. So if we’re trying to break 6 minutes 0 seconds on a 2k, we need to be going at least 1:30 per 500m.
Then you take a nice long 8-10′ break. Obviously shorter is better because we’re training 2k endurance, but if your heart rate is still above 120bpm then you definitely need to rest a bit more. On the other hand, if you’re below 100bpm within the first four-ish minutes, 1) you could go much, much harder, 2) start doing the 500m part now!
Now onto the 6x500m’s. Here you’re basically going to try and beat your pace and then some on each piece. So if your 2k time is 6:00, your pace is 1:30/500m. Well, we’re only going 500m, so make sure you complete each segment under that time. As you do this workout over the course of the season, you’re hopefully going to be getting better so we want to start going under your pace a little bit more each week. Say we want to do 2k-1. That would mean 1:29 each 500m segment. But maybe you can only do that for the first 2x500m… fine. Then hold 1:30 for the next two and try to not go up any higher above 1:31 on the final two. It’s better to miss your goal but stay consistent over the 500m segments than to do really well for the first couple and then limp over the finish line for the last bunch.
Anyway, so that’s the workout. 1x1500m, rest 1′, 1x500m, rest 10′, then 6x500m, 1′ rest inbetween.
Eventually you’ll do a 2K (ideally once a month or so) and then you’ll redo this workout based on that 2K.
Here are the other workouts:
#2 – 10K at 155HR (this is based on a college-aged male, so adjust HRs as necessary)
#3 – 13′,12′,11′,10′,9′,8′,7′,6′,5′,4′,3′,2′,1′:1′ rest inbetween, 150HR
#4 – 3×30′, 4-6′ rest inbetween, 150HR/155HR/160HR
#5 – 4x5000m, keep between 150-160HR on all of them but go 16/18/20/18 SPM (strokes per minute)
These are all what we’d call steady state.
#6 – 3×15′, 7′ rest inbetween, 160-170HR. If you’ve done a 6K before, you want to be at 6K+5. If you’ve done a 5K before, you want to be at 5K+7. If you’ve been doing the steady state workouts, you want to be pace-10.
#7 – 2x6k, 10′ rest inbetween, 170-180HR. Same pacing as #6, but preferably a little faster, like 6K+3, or steady state pace-15
#8 – (my personal favorite) 2x8x1k, same pacing as #6. Take a minute break inbetween each 1K and a longer break inbetween the first 8x1k and the second 8x1k. If this is the first time you do it, you might want to just do a single set of 8x1k one week, then 8x1k and 8x4k a second week, then so on to slowly build until you’re doing 2x8x1k at the desired pace.
These are all what we’d call AT (anaerobic threshold) workouts. They’re what help you build physical and mental capacity for racing. While the first workout (#1) is the speed workout (and it’s brother, the 8x500m), those are both short. You need longer workouts to essentially be the foundation for your speed work.
Anyway, I’ve labored on for more than I intended, but hopefully this highlights some of the real work you want to be doing on an erg. Sure you can go for a lazy row once in a while, but that’d be like going to a gym to just walk on a treadmill… if you’re at the gym or on the water, you might as well make it challenging!
Swim this afternoon, 10 minute warm up then 1600m broken up into intervals of 200m, 20 seconds rest between each. 10min warm down
My training plan would be:
– HIIT (12km/h run; 8km/h rest; 1.30:1.00 mins ratio)
– AB cruncher machine (30kg; 10reps; 3sets)
– arm curl (12kg; 10reps; 3sets)
– full squat with weight (12kg; 10reps; 3sets)
– wide hands push up (10reps; 3sets)
– close hands push up (10reps; 3sets)
Interval ladder on the bike at about 95-100% effort
1 min on 1 min rest
2 min on 2 min rest
3 min on 3 min rest
4 min on 4 min rest
4 min on 4 min rest
3 min on 3 min rest
2 min on 2 min rest
1 min on 1 min rest
5k run outside (I have two days of +10C surrounded by sub zero temps and snow).
run – bike – run
was the last 3 day with good weather really fun
Deep water workout after a few months off (7 weeks postpartum)
Congratulations!
1 mi warm up followed by 10x800m intervals with 1.5mi cool down
running 1h ti 1h15 min to get motivated again after a month and a half of sad sad weather,
Run half marathon sunday as training for the marathon!
2 hour bike ride
10-15m FTP intervals with 10m rest
Demain: une demie heure de course et aprés une heure de musculation
Tuesday’s workout is 60 min on the bike small chain ring low effort. Followed by a 30 min run, RPE 3.
5 mile pace run, Wednesday
Warm up for 2km
8×1000 @ marathon pace
2 km easy recovery
5×200 @ 3 min
3000 swim
5x 200 @ 3 min
weekend 25 mile run +50 mile mtb
5 mile run in sunday
Ray- What a great giveaway idea!! My workout was a 16 mile hike up Saddleback Mountain to Santiago Peak in Orange County, California. That mountain (so I have heard) is not very big by west coast standards (Sierras, Rockies, Ranier, etc.) but it is supposedly taller than every mountain except one west of the Mississippi. That means in all of the Catoctins, Catskills, Alleghenies, Smokies, etc. there is only one mountain taller than the climb I’m doing. It is a 16 mile climb that peaks out at 5,687 feet of elevation. So excited!!!
I’ll be doing workout 1 of week 3 of the 5k running program of the Zombies, Run! app. Getting chased by zombies is a great motivator to keep your pace up :-)
I’ll be doing a few olympic lifting sessions as well as riding my bike a few times. Gotta get one run and one swim in as well.
Hi Ray,
Tuesday training will be a 1 hour technical speed skating sedsion, with lots of painstaking focus on style, posture and timing. this is followed by a 1 hour session to go with the days feeling.
Nice work on the site. Love this giveaway, would like the Garmin Fenix package to use in Geocaching, outdoor running/trail activities
I’m planning a 2 hour spinning lesson.
I think i’ll go or a quick tempo run
One foot isn’t doing well, so the next workout will probably a pull bouy only swimming workout again.
Getting warmed up, doing some regular swimming, some meters technics, doing some intervals, doing some more lanes and swimming out.
Pushups 5 sets: 14, 18, 14, 14, 20
Well, since i really need to do something to improve my climbing, it´ll be a hunted sufferfest.
10 miles @ 6.30 a mile, ballycotton Ireland
Time Trial Intervals today –
1hr easy warm up
3×10 km building to 175bpm by the end (then 5 minute recoveries). Flat to slightly rolling course. Challenge yourself with big gears. On time trial set-up. 85-100 rpm. Aero position. Wait for blurred vision.Try not to barf.
30 mins cool down
Spring is almost here in the great Northwest. So a quick 20 mile ride out and back on the Spring Water Trail. Enough riding on the trainer in the bsmt. at least one time this week. Maybe twice if the warm weather holds.
Hey Ray, I hope I get lucky this time around. I’m working on my core so lots of core strengthening excercises and aerobic sessions on the trainer to use the new cadence sensor I just installed yesterday.
Run as many laps as I can with out dropping.
Yesterday 20min@10k tempo run + 30min@T21, today LSD but not so slow: 26k@T21 (1h40)
Run15 Km & Mountainbike 25Km.