Week in Review–February 15th, 2014

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 in the past week:

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

Sunday: Week in Review–February 8th, 2015
Thursday: Everything you ever wanted to know about the Garmin HRM-RUN
Friday: Valentine’s Day Double-Gadget Giveaway!

Yes, a bit quieter of a week.  I was sick the previous weekend and that impacted things a bit combined with some messy work travel earlier in the week.

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) Increasing running cadence decreases impact forces:  Good stuff, especially since the study group was a bit larger in quantity than many I often see. (via Steve Magness)

2) Will this game-changing freehub ever make it to market?  Cool concept, especially for those of us with different cassette combinations to deal with. Though, breaking into and establishing any form of ‘standard’ in the cycling components market is borderline impossible unfortunately.  (via Jeff D.)

3) Pole Vaulting with a GoPro: This is pretty sweet, and a simple yet very well edited video with cameras all over creation (drone, pole, person, mounted elsewhere, etc…).

4) How Paris would handle the 2024 Summer Olympics: It’s really cool to see that virtually everything on this list is within the city boundaries (or, just a couple kilometers outside of it).  This compared with the recent Olympic trend (especially summer games) of having many events in flat-out different countries hundreds of miles away (or more).

5) Video of inflation of skiing airbag during unexpected avalanche: Very impressive stuff, both the video, and to a degree the awareness to trigger the airbag.

6) On sponsorships and watch companies: I should point out first that as a person I think Dean is pretty impressive from an athlete’s standpoint.  And probably even a cool guy.  But from a sponsorship standpoint I find it funny that he’s now twice endorsed devices that realistically won’t do what he opines.  For example, a couple of years ago he was sponsored by Motorola and the Motoactiv.  At the launch he noted how he used it constantly in training (as an ultra runner).  Which was funny, since the device’s battery didn’t last more than 2hrs at that point (it was later extended a number of hours).  Then here, with Fitbit and discussing specifically using the Surge for interval training with heart rate and the importance of fast responding.  When, the Surge specifically just isn’t very good at that (at all).  I suppose in general, I could call this paragraph: ‘Keepin’ it real’.

7) UCI to stream onboard live footage: Pretty cool to see them testing this out this upcoming week at track worlds (just outside of Paris).  I’d go, but I’m pretty sure I’m not in town (wrong continent…again).

8) Skydiving plane clips parachuters on way down: Epic footage. And fairly damn lucky peoples.

9) Stand-up paddle boarding on a nearly frozen lake: Not sure what it is with putting someone in a wetsuit surrounded by ice – but it almost always ends up looking pretty cool.

10) Power meters and social media analysis: You can geek out on graphs and charts in this post.  Though, also interesting to see that while certain companies are increasing social presence, some stats (such as the Kona bike count for PM’s) show adoption going the opposite way.

Crowd Funded Projects of Athletic Note:

I regularly sift through Kickstarter and Indiegogo (plus a few others on occasion) looking for sports projects.  If you’re unfamiliar with projects, read my detailed post on how I decide which projects I personally back.  Note that as always with crowd funded projects, assume the project will be late and will under-deliver on features. Thus far, on the numerous products I’ve helped ‘fund’ (except a leather bike handle), that’s been the case.

Fly12 Cycling Accessory | 1080p Camera & Front Light Combo:

I ran through a preview of this a few weeks ago.  Great to see them launch, and especially cool to see them already blowing through nearly half a million dollars in the first few days.  Solid stuff.

Sports Technology Software/Firmware Updates This Week:

Each week I quickly highlight some of the new firmware, app, software and website service updates that I see go out. If you’re a sports technology company and release an update – shoot me a quick note (just one liners is perfect, or Tweet it at me is even better) and I’ll make mention of it here. If I don’t know about it, I won’t be able to post about it. Sound good?

Garmin FR920XT: Lots of updates here, both new features and fixes.  This takes the previously beta features and puts them in production: http://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=7249

Garmin Fenix3: A few minor fixes, but also the addition of key lock.

Garmin Fenix2: Improved Android compatibility.

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Thanks for reading, and have a good remainder of your weekend!

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