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.
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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!
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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.
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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!
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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.
Tag Archives: Random
Classic Rainmaker posts: This week in years past
I’m often told that when new readers arrive here they end up going on a prolonged post to post journey, sometimes diverting untold hours of their day to simply reading a portion of the more then 1,000 posts that I’ve … Read More Here
The blogs I read every day –a compilation of awesomeness
I read a lot out on the web, well, I try to read a lot anyway. Sometimes I fail, and sometimes things slip through – but my general goal is to consume as much goodness as possible and pass it … Read More Here
Ballgames, Bags and Boxes
The last few days have been a bit of a blur – hence the reason why things have been somewhat quiet on the rainmaker front. On Wednesday night I had a surprise bachelor party thrown for me when my brother … Read More Here
This day in…the past three years.
Think of this as a mini-time capsule. Like a buried treasure map leading to an infinite amount of knowledge. Each of the items I linked to has either plenty of entertainment or totally useful information (or even both!). And while … Read More Here
The lost photos archive
Over the last few weeks my cell phone has been acting a wee bit slow when I go to take photos. After a bit of searching I found that it may be because I have too many photos on it. … Read More Here
Friday Tidbits: Spring’s gonna be busy for new toys!
(Side Note: I have no idea what on earth this clipart image is depicting. I was searching for random images to use for this post using the Microsoft Word clipart selection and out of curiosity entered ‘triathlon’ – and got … Read More Here
The Russian DCRainmaker brother from another mother?
Given it’s a snowy Thursday here in the nation’s capital – I figured this would be the perfect time to unleash a post that’s been sitting in my drafts for months…from one snowy place to another. A while ago a … Read More Here
Have a Merry Christmas!
To all those that celebrate Christmas, have a Merry Christmas tomorrow! And remember, it’s not all about training. One or two days a year you can enjoy it and just relax. (Photo from when the Christmas Tree fell over into … Read More Here
Quick Administrative Notes and Updates
Just a quick note to let folks know I had a bit of time on my most recent 13 hour flight earlier this morning (this evening? this afternoon? Honestly, I have no idea, it sorta crossed all three). I took … Read More Here
Turf Wars
Given how many fitness related devices I have floating around the house, one would think there would pretty much never be any issue when it came to sharing toys in the sandbox. After all, I have enough of the different … Read More Here
Whisky Foxtrot…Part II
If you’ve been following my blog long enough – at least two years – then you may remember the comical story locker room story of Whisky Foxtrot (if you haven’t, then you must click.that.link). Now while he’s seemingly disappeared from … Read More Here
Friday Tidbits
Just a bunch of little updates for the week going into the long weekend here in the states. I do however want to say thanks for the huge response on the Withings Scale review. It was by far the biggest … Read More Here
Can you name details about this picture?
For Tuesday I’m going to go with something a little bit different than a normal post. Last week The Girl and I participated in a bit of an experiment…with our bikes. This experiment took quite a bit of time actually … Read More Here
Pushing the envelope
It finally happened, almost 6 years to the day from when it first started. What happened you ask? Well, first, some history. I moved from Seattle to Washington DC on May 1st, 2004 (6 years ago tomorrow) – and when … Read More Here
Free National Park Access for a week, starting Saturday! Wootage!
As many of you know, over the past few years I’ve spent an inordinate amount of time up on Skyline Drive in Shenandoah National Park, which…is part of the National Park System. Not only is it probably the best cycling … Read More Here
A list of cool tri/running/cycling wallpapers
Back a bit ago I was stumbling around Garmin’s site trying to find something or other and I bumped into their nifty collection of wallpapers that you can download. From there I got curious and started poking around other companies … Read More Here
Applying Toilet Water
As I mentioned on Sunday, I had a small collection of boxes arrive last week while I was out. I generally buy everything online, so me and the FedEx man and the UPS women have a special relationship. Though, from … Read More Here
Coned
Earlier in the week I had finished up my bike and run and was delegated to go to the grocery store to search out options for dinner. Meanwhile, the Girl was just leaving for a short run. Given I had … Read More Here
Friday Tidbits
Food Tidbits: It’s time for some food around here – so let’s start off Friday Morning with Thursday Morning’s breakfast: I stumbled on the super-simple recipe the night before on SLB’s blog, and was on the way to the grocery … Read More Here
Weekend Tidbits
This weekend was full of all sorts of stuff – to start off with, The Girl was busy making Valentines cookies…and I was busy eating them: Of course, post-cookies there was some brief running to do – in the Cupid’s … Read More Here
Funny things that float my way
We have finally made it to Friday, on a week that has been the longest…week…ever. For a week where everyone has been buried in the DC area, it’s time for some humor (actually, to be fair, even though I had … Read More Here
Polar Bear Plunge…sort of.
Both Rob and I had our respective workouts to finish in the morning before heading up to the Polar Bear Plunge. I had an hour run and an hour swim, and he had a 16-18 mile run. So by time … Read More Here
Pants on the ground
Earlier this week I had an early morning swim technique session. By ‘early morning’, I mean 6:30AM – or as soon as the pool opened to non-high school swimmers. Which for me…is dang early. As I’ve mentioned in the past, … Read More Here
Tuesday Tidbits
Lacking the time or thought capabilities to put together a solid and lengthy post, I present you many little tidbits… Garmin FR-60: I can’t remember if I mentioned this or not, but Garmin sent me out a FR-60 running/cycling watch … Read More Here
Friday Mail Call
I got all sorts of interesting things in the mail this week. Both physical mail, as well as e-mail. And I’m not just talking about the coupons either – we’re talking high quality stuff. First up was a little Christmas … Read More Here
Friday Tidbits
As part of some upcoming work travel trips I’ve been filling out a crap-ton of visa applications for different countries. I have a list of some 31 countries, of which I’ll be visiting about a third of over the next … Read More Here
Running around
I’m starting (though semi-resisting) to get back into a rhythm. Albeit at the moment that may or may not include much time getting wet in the pool. But I do drive by it occasionally – that counts, right? Saturday morning … Read More Here
Turkey Turkey
As I had mentioned on Sunday, I started my Thanksgiving dinner preparations a bit earlier in the week, with pumpkin pie. But, those two pies didn’t exactly last very long around these parts – and certainly not until Thursday. So … Read More Here
The Great Turtle Escape
I’ve had turtles forever…since I was a tiny little kid. Of course, when I got my first turtle, our family didn’t know much about turtles. My friend had a few box turtles and I had decided they were too boring, … Read More Here
A look inside Lance Armstrong’s bike shop
While down in Austin this past week I had a chance to checkout Lance’s bike shop, which is called Mellow Jonny’s. Before I went I checked out the website – which honestly came off a bit over the top. They … Read More Here
Thursday Tidbits
In no particular order, here’s a couple of things related to me…and not related to me. 1) Swim interrupted…again: Wednesday night’s swim was dinked again when the lifeguards called a 5-minute ‘safety break’. Something about being short-staffed and needing a … Read More Here
Little presents
I generally appreciate little random presents. Most little presents are surprises, and most of the time, they are good. So this weekend I was excited to find a little present in my mailbox after finishing my rather long workout. After … Read More Here
Running from the police (Part II)
I was downtown (DC) today for a series of meetings and related stuffs, which is somewhat unusual in that I generally work from home. I had finished up my day and was heading out of a building and made it … Read More Here
Ironman and Ironman 70.3 Age Group Drug Testing
A few weeks back, the World Triathlon Corporation (owners of Ironman and 70.3 races) announced that it would be increasing and expanding it’s programs around drug testing. However, it’s the follow little snippet that caught everyone’s attention: “Additionally, a Registered … Read More Here
Friday tidbits
Let’s see, what’s been going on in the Rainmaker world… Well, first, I fixed my RSS feed. There was an ‘issue’, resulting from the otherwise massive size of the 310XT review post (68 pages in Word, in case you’re wondering), … Read More Here