Hey there Newsletter readers,

Yes, as promised, I am back in your inbox already with the race report from this past weekend! It was a surprising result, and I am excited to tell you all about it. More details below!

We’ve had a pick-up in new newsletter subscribers lately, so I’m just going to take a moment to say hi. I’m Bobbie, the other half of the DCR website. I write these newsletters (mostly) bi-monthly. The first half is my uncensored opinions on what Ray has reviewed/posted/said since the last newsletter. There is a time or two that Ray will chime in on my sarcasm or add a quick thought, but 99.99% this newsletter is my little slice of the internet. The second half of the newsletter, “In-Depth Thoughts of The Girl,” is an inside look into what’s happening in the DC Rainmaker world as of late.

I have added a little bit of advertising space to the newsletter, partly to give a shout-out to the brands we really like and use, and partly to help pay for my training and racing efforts. This way, the newsletter becomes a little self-sustaining ecosystem; I keep writing so I can keep racing, and then have something to write to you about!  

Speaking of which, thanks to TriRig for supporting this week’s newsletter edition. More below, plus a DCR discount code!

First up, the continuing saga of the Strava vs Garmin Lawsuit. While this whole charade might have been good clickbait for media outlets across the industry, in the end, it’s not only Strava that loses here. It’s super disappointing, even though I’m not a devout Strava user, lots of people are (in fact, the last time I posted on Strava, a follower responded on my workout, “was this post on purpose?” followed by laughy emojis. But I am a huge believer in health and wellness, and I do think that Strava’s community is a place that people have turned to for motivation, inspiration, and even accountability with their exercise. It really sucks that their selfish and short-sighted actions caused so many people say “no thank you”, and, rightfully so, left the platform.

Next up, we have the new partnership between Meta and Oakley, creating the Vangaurd Glasses. You guys know me by now, I’m not in love with adding extra tech to anything. Tech needs to be a seamless addition and not a distraction for me to be interested; maybe I’m too obsessed with my prescribed workouts, but if a product adds an extra step or interrupts a workout set for me, it’s usually dead to me hahaha. I will say the hands-free accessibility of this is insane, so that’s a huge check mark (tho I am proud of my continuing improvement with on-bike holding of action cam selfie sticks). I’m hugely picky on fit of sunglasses, so I don’t think I’m a fair opinion there, and I also never ride or run with music, so the audio is of zero interest to me. I WILL say, after the workout, the ability to overlay the workout metrics/data on the video is amazing. I’ve said for years that Garmin Connect's photo option is such an afterthought and missed opportunity. This is exactly the post-production view that most of us wanted! So bravo there. Ray talks about this feature right about here in the video.

Then we have the Pixel Watch 4: In-Depth Review. While I will likely never wear the Pixel watch, as it doesn’t do quite what I want for my training, I WOULD like to bang the drums for them in appreciation for adding the Emergency SOS Response feature. Did you hear me Garmin?? Yes, I’m still, and will forever be, pissed off at Garmin that the latest Garmin Fenix 8 Pro (which added satellite SOS & LTE connectivity) doesn't have a smaller version for small-wristed folks, namely women. I’m going to take a moment to name a few women who also might have appreciated the feature: Eliza Fletcher, Mollie Tibbettes, Laken Riley, Alyssa Lokits, Wendy Martinez, Lauren Heike … Please go ahead and click those links, and read about those women. I could go on, and on, and on, as these are names of only a few women who just happened to catch media attention due to horrific reasons over the past few years. I don’t care who I make annoyed by this statement; this is the hill I will metaphorically die on. Companies need to do better; companies have a responsibility to make safety features fully available in products, LTE-enabled, auto distress calls, live tracking, etc. The tech is readily available in smaller watches like the Pixel watches, Samsung watches, and Apple watches, and advancing so fast that, it’s my opinion, these watches need tracking and safety just like your watch strap needs a clasp.

Last up, the Fit File boys do it again. Check out their latest episode as they discuss the new player in the game of “let’s make drama”. Here they ask the question, Is there more trouble ahead for Whoop?

In-Depth Thoughts of The Girl

Hi Hi! As promised, I’m hitting you up with the race report from this past weekend here in Mallorca. I raced the Challenge Family Peguera Middle distance triathlon (similar to sparkling wine and Champagne, I cannot call this a 70.3 distance race as it was not an Ironman event; however, middle distance is equal to a 70.3 distance race…). Moving on  :)

As I mentioned in the last newsletter, this was very much a tune-up race for me. My coach and I had negotiated terms and conditions for this race in the means of capped watts, heart rates, and running paces. It was acting as a great opportunity to see where I was at fitness-wise, finalize nutrition set-up, practice catching people’s bubbles on the swim, and transition practice, etc. You get the point.

Thursday, Ray and I scooted down to the packet pick-up. A whopping 3 exits from our house made this race very convenient. I could have done this on Friday as well, but it was just nice to have everything early. Friday night we also had our girls’ first swim meet, so there was enough happening on Friday that it was actually super nice to have Thursday as a packet pick-up option as well.

Friday was simple, I washed up the bike, organized the gear bags, and dropped off all the gear and bike at the race venue. With Friday done and dusted, I’ll go ahead and skip straight to Saturday morning!

Race morning 

Heading into transition, there wasn't much to do other than loading up the bike with nutrition and hydration, plus getting my Garmin head unit up and firing. Topped off my tires and headed to the women's change tent to where our gear bags were, double-checking all was still good.

For those wondering nutrition-wise, prior to the race I drink a 500ml Precision Fuel and Hydration (now to be referred to as PFH) 1500 electrolyte drink, and about 10 min prior to the start of the swim, I’ll take down a PFH 30g gel with Caffeine.

This year, there was a new swim course for the race, a W-shaped swim, which I liked very much. For me, sighting was very clear, straight out, around two swim buoys, and straight back again, then out of the water, run around the beach buoy/timing mat, and back out again for the second bump of the W shape.

This was great because, unlike other “Aussie Exits,” you didn’t do two circle loops and end up with the faster swimmers swimming on top of you for the second loop. I really felt the W shape kept it really clean, especially as my swim wave was over 20 minutes later than the first swim wave. For me, a self-titled “less than awesome swimmer”, this was best case swim organization as the W breaks the swim up a bit (both mentally and motivation-wise), and kept me from getting pummeled by the male swimmers on lap 2 who already had a 3-20 minute head-start. Bravo Challenge on this new design.

In the end, I nailed the swim plan I set for myself. I swam and sighted the course perfectly, no extra sightseeing for me, I practiced holding on in the draft of a few athletes’ bubbles, and hopped out with a time of 36:38. Anything under 38 minutes for me was a win! Later, I was to find out that others in the female category (and my age group) got out at 26-27 minutes… so yeah, they got away from me with a 10-11 minute head-start, off hunting I would go!

Transition zone was very smooth, possibly because the women’s swim wave went out last, and I was 10+ minutes behind most of the women, so I had the place to myself! (please laugh with me on this subject). This might make others feel a little defeated, but I don’t mind. I like chasing down ponytails poking out of helmets on the bike and reeling them in.

This bike course I loved. A solid chunk of it is part of my weekly ride, specifically the climbing and descending sections in Es Capdella and into Peguera. The course was about 2,800ft (860m) of climbing, which is about half of the climbing I will see in a few weekends' time in Marbella. A few of my least favorite parts were through Santa Ponca community/neighborhood roads, maybe 4ish miles for each loop, which slowed me down quite a bit. But that was fine, the roads were well marked, swept, and most importantly, closed to traffic! I ended up finishing the ride in 2:47:52 and held a normalized power of 2.96 watts/kg. I was super happy with that, especially considering I took it easy going through the neighborhood sections. Go ahead and call me a careful Nancy, I don’t mind, I still have all my skin intact, and that is more than I can say for at least 6 racers I saw on Saturday.

Nutrition-wise, I had about 1.5L of fluids on the bike, bottles filled with PFH Carb and Electrolyte mix (90cabs total). In my snazzy PFH top tube flask, I also had about 150g of PFH Flow Gel. Lastly, I had a single 30g Gel with caffeine in my back pocket. The caffeine was timed to take about 30 minutes before getting off the bike for a little boost on the run. I aim to take about 500ml of water an hour, and about 90g of carb an hour. I’m a super salty sweater, so I really like the carb/electrolyte mix option as well. I had packed enough for a 3-hour ride, as I always overestimate, so I don’t end up in a situation where I’m relying on the aid stations.

The weather on race day was so beautiful. I didn’t notice any winds, and the temps were around 70*F/21*C on the bike. Couldn’t have asked for better conditions! With the bike done and dusted, I rolled back into the transition zone. I was very happy to see the ladies’ section of T2 very much the same way I had left it. It looked to me that I was one of the first ones back from my section of bikes. With only a handful of bikes hanging up, off I went to the run for my final stage of stalking efforts!

For the run there isn’t too much to say. On paper, the course honestly looks miserable with so many out-and-back hairpin turns, but in person, I didn’t mind the course at all. It was 4x the same loop, and while I know some people hate that, I’m pretty happy on a looped course. Keeping in mind, I’m usually racing from close to last out of the water and then left working all day to claw myself into a top position. Looped courses help keep me motivated by letting me see who is ahead of me and by how much.

The temps kicked up a bit by the run, I think, when I finished someone said it was 75*F/24*C. That was actually delightful for me, one of our coolest weekends in a while. I was still super salty by the end of the day, but feeling really good.

Now, I will say this was a bit of a weird one for me, because as you’re probably tired of hearing by now, this wasn’t a race-race for me. I wasn’t allowed to go for it on the run and really dig deep, so I just bumbled along at a nice Z-3 pace. Ray and the girls were down at the beach for most of the race, giving me big cheers when I’d go along the promenade, then of course back to their elaborate sand castle village they were working on. I was really proud of my restraint on the run.

So I just kept bumblin’ along, I felt great, kept the HR controlled. Total run time was 1:42:53, average HR 177 (which is low for me!), and average pace of 7:54min/mile (4:54 min/Km). I didn’t stop at all, chugged on through the aid stations, took 4x PFH 30g gel packets (one straight after T2), 4x PFH salt tabs. Funny enough, this was my fastest triathlon run time of the year… amazing what you can do when you show up to a race healthy and with “fair” racing conditions. My coach also joked that sometimes the “More is Less” concept might be a new strategy for me! In the end, I found the finish line, and found myself in 3^rd place for 40-44 year old ladies, which was a very nice cherry on top of my day!

The Challenge Peguera-Mallorca race has won Challenge 'Race of the Year', three times now, and it isn’t hard to see why. The communications, the course quality, the atmosphere on race day were all awesome. Not to mention the whole community is involved throughout the weekend; Friday night there’s a kids running race and an all-women’s 4km race, and Sunday morning the Kids Aquathon! There’s a pasta party where all athletes get a ticket and can be used at several different participating restaurants around Peguera. And then last but not least, the awards ceremony in the evening was really cool. They had traditional dancers, smoke machines, pyrotechnics, and I believe there was even an “after party” but at that point our kiddos were toast and we headed home.

I was going to do a small race report on the kids' race on Sunday as well, but I think you’ve probably read enough by now. I will say, if you’re looking for an end-of-year race in 2026, this is really a fun one to check out, especially if it lines up with your kids' half-term holidays. With all the events for kids to get involved in, or simply if they are beach goers like mine. It was a fun day and weekend for the whole family. So cheers to Challenge Family on a really well done event, and to Challenge Mallorca, I hope to see you again next year!

As promised, we have a new advertiser on board this week, TriRig. They are sending me a new cockpit setup for my girl, Joey. Unfortunately, there was a bumble in customs last month, and to no fault of TriRig’s, my setup was sent back to the USA (insert: GASPS LOUDLY!). Hopefully, I can get everything organized prior to the Worlds here in a few weeks, but in the meantime, TriRig is extending to you all a 15% discount, just use the code DCRain.

I will for sure slide into your inbox again before Marbella. Until then, thanks for being a DC Rainmaker Newsletter Subscriber.

Cheers!

Bobbie