Heads up!!! Here’s your massive holiday sports tech deals list! This includes the Garmin Epix for just $419, the Apple AirTag 4-Pack for just $69, the GoPro Hero 12 Black for $249, (or the brand new Hero 13 or $299!) and plenty more! Go check out the full list of 100+ deals here!
I’m DC RAINMAKER…
I swim, bike and run. Then, I come here and write about my adventures. It’s as simple as that. Most of the time. If you’re new around these parts, here’s the long version of my story.
You'll support the site, and get ad-free DCR! Plus, you'll be more awesome. Click above for all the details. Oh, and you can sign-up for the newsletter here!
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.Want to compare the features of each product, down to the nitty-gritty? No problem, the product comparison data is constantly updated with new products and new features added to old products!
Wanna create comparison chart graphs just like I do for GPS, heart rate, power meters and more? No problem, here's the platform I use - you can too!
Think my written reviews are deep? You should check out my videos. I take things to a whole new level of interactive depth!
Smart Trainers Buyers Guide: Looking at a smart trainer this winter? I cover all the units to buy (and avoid) for indoor training. The good, the bad, and the ugly.
-
Check out my weekly podcast - with DesFit, which is packed with both gadget and non-gadget goodness!
Get all your awesome DC Rainmaker gear here!
FAQ’s
I have built an extensive list of my most frequently asked questions. Below are the most popular.
- Do you have a privacy policy posted?
- Why haven’t you yet released a review for XYZ product you mentioned months ago?
- Will you test our product before release?
- Are you willing to review or test beta products?
- Which trainer should I buy?
- Which GPS watch should I buy?
- I’m headed to Paris – what do you recommend for training or sightseeing?
- I’m headed to Washington DC – what do you recommend for training?
- I’m from out of the country and will be visiting the US, what’s the best triathlon shop in city XYZ?
- What kind of camera do you use?
-
5 Easy Steps To The Site
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.
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!
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.
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!
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 2024 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 hate to nitpick, but Edmonton and Calgary are both cities in Alberta :). Just wondering where Paceline Designs is located.
Doh, Edmonton.
Love the Timbit reference…
The base plate is poorly designed imo because you can’t easily move it forward or backward, which is something I found myself often did. And $239 seems to be quite excessive for such a low tech gadget.
You can rotate the upper portion of the desk without changing the bottom portion.
Cool table, but way overpriced. There are 30 dollar tablet stands on amazon that will do the job.
Without wheels it’s a no go… I’d be dripping all over my laptop when I get out of the seat if I didn’t have the ability to push it back. Wish the wahoo had the power option though.
Because you can rotate the top portion of the desk out of the way, it sorta resolves the wheel issue.
Looks like a well-thought-out design and solid construction. Certainly looks more stable than the $20 music stand I use for watching a tablet. Not sure I would trust the music stand to hold my laptop without rotating, since it’s not really designed to work flat. I might take a cue from their design and strap an outlet strip to the music stand, though.
I also use a music stand, a Manhasset, and I can report that with a little bit of tightening on the swivel screw, a laptop (Mac Air) sits just fine.
Can you devote a post on your workout room/ how you stay organized?
DCR Cave Tour – 2016 Edition!
I get that the Wahoo Kickr Desk is a more substantial desk, albeit lacking some features in version 1. But this paceline desk reeks of the $30-50 desks. Now there is nothing wrong with those $30-$50 desks, I actually use one regularly and it rocks, but has pneumatic up-down, and was $50. I would not pay $250 for the same desk.
I won’t be spammy and mention the specific product but I can’t for the life of me see why you send your readers to this desk company. I realize the margins must be fat, but why can’t you help out your readers and just point them to the less expensive alternatives? Instead of telling them to google it or look in the Kickr Desk post. Help them out, link to the post, link to the specific comments, or link to the product on Amazon. I know you have channels setup to monetize it and still make some $$$.
Hopefully you approve of this comment and hopefully the rest of your readers do to.
+Thomas
Hi Thomas-
I don’t actually make any money off of the Paceline Designs stand (indirectly, directly, or any other way). They don’t have any agreements with Amazon or others for resell of the product. They simply sent a unit over to check out, and I checked it out. So your comment about “margins must be fat”, seems a bit…
I’m not ‘sending’ them to this company. I’m not sponsored, and thus I don’t much care whether people buy from them or not. I review plenty of random things simply because it’s interesting and different from just being GPS watch review. I think it’s fairly obvious from my comments the pros and cons of it. As well as my comments about alternatives. I was pretty clear where to look (comments section of the KICKR desk review, which I linked to) for numerous reader suggestions including photos, and not just force feed one option down peoples throat.
Still, here’s a link to one of the sub-$50 bedside tables on Amazon: link to amzn.to
Cheers.
Hi Thomas,
Mike here – one half of Paceline Designs. My response is I can’t disagree – there are absolutely lower-cost (and zero-cost), functional alternatives out there. And we saw as we prototyped The Podium that for the majority of riders, those alternatives would meet their needs in terms of cost and utility.
We went ahead anyway because we believed a niche of people might want a fixture that is purpose-built, powered, yadda yadda yadda. Not trying to redo the marketing pitch here.
A couple months in, we can quantify from our own sales – all of which gained traction before Ray said he wanted to get a look at it – that such a niche exists.
So while you and most folks may not be in our niche, we do have one, and we think we can serve it in parallel to the overbed desks, music stands, bar stools, and nifty DIY setups out there.
-Mike
ps. our product is Made in Canada at not-quite-automaker levels of economies of scale in aluminum and machining. So the margins? Not “fat.”
Do you not ride with a fan on? If so do you just put it under? My go-to is still a card table with a Surface in front and a fan behind it.
I put my fan slightly off-center actually, so it comes at me from about the 1-2 o’clock angle.
I use an ironing board! Multi purpose
Too expensive, there is definitely a market for a decently priced laptop podium!
As always, thanks for the write up. This table review came at the right time as I have been looking for a small table while on the trainer. As many people have mentioned here that this is very expensive for a table. Do you have any recommendations for inexpensive (> $50) functional ones? I have heard about using a music stand? Thanks again, your reviews and site is awesome!
There’s a few suggestions for medical bed stands people have found in the other post that seem to work reasonably well. Not super pretty – but certainly do the trick!
IMO all trainer desks have the same flaw: with a desk it is not possible to set up the fan in front of the bike. A good fan is big, as wide as the handlebars, so it really needs some space. I guess the only option would be to set it below the desk, blowing up.
I just use a music stand. Not this one specifically, but identical in design.Less than $30 and works great with my laptop, towel, phone, etc.
link to amazon.com
I need this too in my office! Awesome! This’ll solve my all problems of lack of movement. Thank you for the idea!
21USD – link to ikea.com
Add some 3M Command cable organizers…
The ikea desk is quite low, not nearly as high as the podium. Had one years ago for different purpose.
My key use case for an iPad case = a wonderfully inquisitive toddler with a propensity to drop stuff. Rear side scratch vanity aside, that possibly does it.
Ray, recommendation for an iPhone 6 bike mount as Zwift works great on it with my new KICKR? For Some reason it just wasn’t smooth on my iPad.
Try the Quadlock mount and casing. Works well for me on Trainerroad and Zwift
Thank you it looks like a great product. The one thing i cannot find any information on is whether or not you can mount the phone in landscape version such that it will allow full screen viewing for Zwift. Please let me know if you know. I would most likely order the out front mount.
Quadlock is good, though you can also make your own Garmin quarter-turn compatible iPhone mount case too, which is what I use: link to blog.trainerroad.com
I would use mine for outdoor too once the weather improves, so at this point really hoping to understand if the quad lock will allow you to mount the phone in landscape mode?
Do you think this would work as a (small) standing desk? Looking for adjustable height for the Surface Studio.
That might be tough. It’d be very close to the limits for the size up top, and also I wonder if the fact that it swivels around might be problematic (meaning, it might move in circles as you tried to use the pen/etc on it).
Any recommendations for when you are in the TT position? I have a podium desk and like it but when I am in the TT position its doesn’t go low enough to view a monitor running Zwift. I also have to have one of these cheap stands to hold my laptop nearby.
Oddly enough, the Ikea desk may be the better answer if it’s not low enough for you. The ‘problem’ with the Ikea desk is that it doesn’t go very high for everyone else, but may actually work in this case.
Great timing, as mine arrived today and I’m heading home to assemble and use it.
Pricey? Sure. But I’d rather buy a finished product than begin building my own Franken-table. Given two working parents (one travels a lot) and two kids (7 and 5) I prefer spending my free time exercising than building a less-expensive product. Something that cost $50 in materials and costs $100+ in creation time begins to look not-to-affordable.
YMMV, of course.
So after assembly I’m a tad concerned. With a 24″ monitor on it, the platform eclectic-so-slightly leans away from the support pole. See the photo to see.
Would appreciate feedback from the Paceline people about this. It isn’t a giant monitor, but I am thinking this will be annoying over time.
Hi Jon,
Message received. I have the same size monitor I think (see pic) and never had this issue, but I think we can help.
Will email you direct to resolve.
Mike
Thanks Mike. I appreciate it.
Like the concept overall but the lean is a bit of a concern.
I wonder how you are able to fight gravity here, everything seems to hold up so well!
FOLLOW-UP TO PLATFORM LEAN
After emailing with Jim and Mike (12/27-29), they determined that there might be an issue with the base of the unit I received. They quickly got another base into the mail to me, and I got it last week (1/6). Biz travel prevented me from installing it until yesterday (1/12).
Suffice to say, it seems my original had a slight bend to it, and the replacement base has shown no tilt at all. Everything lines up perfectly. Monitor is straight and there is no wobble.
Maybe there was a production issue with some of them, but Jim and Mike said they took a base from their warehouse and sent it out to me — it wasn’t a special order/creation. So I wouldn’t have any qualms about ordering one. They’re aware there was an issue with one or two and seem to have addressed it.
I didn’t get any refund or anything, and they didn’t ask me to write this follow up. So no “coaching” or fakery going on.
Great idea! Since I already have a IKEA sit/stand desk, it is now a sit/stand/cycle desk.
My solution that I got number of years ago – a tilting over the bed table. I see that Amazon offers a couple of models with a fixed tray plus the tilting tray – mine the whole tray tilts. At least with the flat part you can have a flower vase – DC’s complaint about not pretty. grin
I use it with a Schwinn recumbent bike – flat for a laptop, tilted if I am reading. It only works with a Nordic Track off to the side. I started with a music stand. For just reading, especially with a Nordic Track, a music stand is probably better.
Better not show an over the bed table to TG (The Girl), otherwise she will be expecting breakfast in bed every day. grin
On separate note, a number of employers here in the States are adding shared exercise work stations to their offices. A treadmill with a keyboard on a table, monitor, PC case on the side, TV on the wall. Bring your own Bluetooth headset.
Wow, that looks just like what I built using old speaker stands and and piece of wood that was lying around the house. I’m amazed that these guys (and Wahoo) try to charge so much for something so simple.
The bedside table recommendation is perfect. It’s got almost the same table height and dimensions of the Wahoo stand and it’s only 25% of the cost.
link to amazon.com
co