Rocket Science Sports Updates

I wanted to let you all know what Rocket Science Sports has been up to over the last couple of weeks. Here is a quick run down:

April 26th - Had Rocket Science Sports booth for stage 6 of the Tour de Georgia at Brasstown Bald.

Night of April 26th - Drove down for the Athens Twilight Criterium. Special guest of race director Ravi Rajcoomar from Swagger. Defending Athen's Champion Mark Hekman and Crit Series Champion Frank Travieso both from Toshiba-Santo presented by Herbalife went down in an early crash and were unable to contest the finish. Ultimately the race was won by Rock Racing's Rahsaan Bahati who enjoyed flowers, girls, and our new Rocket gear bag.

April 27th - Not only my lovely wife's birthday, but the last stage of the Tour de Georgia. I set up a booth in Atlanta in the infamous Centennial Park where we were rained on for the first half of the day. Luckily the rain held out during my setting up and tearing down. Thank you very much! It was amazing to look around at the buildings downtown and see all the cracked and missing windows from the tornado which hit there only a few weeks before.

Interesting note, two of the pro teams involved in the tour are very interested in our Rocket Bottles and our gear bags. I'll keep you all in suspense of who they are until the details are worked out. :)

May 1st - I flew to Los Angeles where I was picked up from the airport by training coach Robert Keating and whisked away for a 6 hour drive to Lake San Antonio for the Wildflower Triathlon. Robert carried with him what seemed like half the content of Triathlon Lab's store from Redondo Beach for the expo.

Included in that was 2 of the first Rocket race suits to arrive in the country, one medium men's and one medium women's. We dressed up a female mannequin in one and go figure, we got a lot of attention. What especially drew the eyes to our new garment was the very unusual "v" shaped ridges on the back of the shoulders and the lower back. "What are they?" you ask. Well, they are vortex generators, the first ever used on race suits. We also were the first to employ them on a wetsuit.

What happens is that an air bubble is formed behind the shoulders and buttocks while swimming which creates pressure drag. The vortex generators break up this bubble so that there is less of a bubble, and therefore less pressure drag. We are looking at about a 6% reduction in drag. Because the race suit is worn while on the bike, you can bet it aids in drag reduction during this part of the race as well.

Okay, enough tech talk. I've got lots to catch up on. Our next event is luckily in Austin, our home town. Hope to see you all at the Capital of Texas Triathlon May 25th. Cheers!

Rocket Science Sports at Tour de Georgia

For the first time Rocket Science Sports is formally introducing and selling our innovative products at a cycling specific venue, the 2008 Tour de Georgia presented by AT&T. In addition we will be donating one Rocket Bag each day of the race for the VIP silent auction to benefit Children’s Health Care of Atlanta.

Until now, we had been targeting the triathlon market with our products, but due to the enormous popularity of our products we have been encouraged by our dealers as well as the consumer to promote our line among the cycling community. Our Rocket Bottles have also made a big splash as the first aero bottle designed to fit in any standard bottle cage, reducing drag by 16%. Pro Cycling Team Toshiba-Santo presented by Herbalife is supplied with the Elite Bag for traveling and the Rocket Bottle for their time trial events.

We will have a booth during the last two stages of the Tour de Georgia at Brasstown Bald on Saturday April 26th and then at Atlanta Centennial Park on Sunday April 27th.

In nearby Athens that Saturday night we will also be awarding the winner of the pro men, pro women and hand cycle events our bags during the podium ceremony at the most prestigious criterium in America, the Athens Twilight Criterium.

If you happen to be out at the event, please stop by and say hello to me. I am always looking forward to meeting our wonderful supporters.

Cheers!
Darren Zielinski

Review of Triathlon Wetsuit Demo

Last October I posted a video we did with fitness model Karena Dawn demonstrating our preferred method of putting on and taking off a wetsuit. I figured since everyone is really starting to get into the swing of things this spring I'd bring it back for an encore.

Enjoy!

If you would like to embed this video in your own site, visit this link to get the code.

Cheers!

Team Dominance

TOSHIBA-Santo Pro Cycling Team presented by Herbalife

Dominate the Gainesville Georgia Cup

I wanted to send out congratulations to the guys of TOSHIBA-Santo Pro Cycling Team presented by Herbalife for an amazing show in Georgia. Check out their podcast reports on the main page. Below are the stage results and all other race reports can be found here.

Time Trial, 14 k

1. John Murphy, HealthNet presented by Maxxis, 18:48.7

2. Frank Travieso, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife, 19:07.4

3. Chris Butler, Hincapie-Barkley Devo, 19:25.2

4. Bobby Sweeting, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife, 19:25.5

6. Dan Vaillancourt, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife, 19:50.4

7. Alex Hagman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife, 19:54.3

10. Mark Hekman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife, 19:57.8

Road Race, 82 miles

1. Chris Klem, MyogenesisNutrition.com
2. Frank Travieso, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
3. Alex Hagman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
4. Mark Hekman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
5. Tommy Nankervis, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife

Criterium, 60 laps

1. Mark Hekman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
2. Oscar Henao, Clinica Union
3. Frank Travieso, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
4. Bobby Sweeting, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife

Overall

1. Frank Travieso, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
2. Mark Hekman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
3. Bobby Sweeting, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
6. Alex Hagman, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by Herbalife
8. Dan Vaillancourt, TOSHIBA-Santo presented by

Way to go guys!

Rocket Bottle Featured In Bicycling Magazine

The May 08 Issue of Bicycling Magazine has included a review of our Rocket Bottle. The section on page 102 is titled "You CAN Buy Speed" and is within the 2008 Spring Triathlon Guide in that issue. You can take a look for yourself here. And for those of you who already own our water bottles, Bicycling has a link for you to add your own reader review. Very cool!

Lucky for us this issue should sell a little better than others (mostly to women) for the simple fact that Patrick Dempsey is on the cover and is interviewed within. We'll take the extra exposure.

If you just want to cut to the chase, here is what Bicycling had to say about our bottle...

Rocket Science
Rocket Bottle
MSRP: $10

Issue: May 2008 Page: BI102
Editorial Review

Forget those goofy aero-shaped bottles; Rocket Science's round, 21-ounce bottle uses the same dimples found on golf balls--and some aero race wheels--to reduce drag. Quick science lesson: As air flows over the bottle, it separates; the turbulence in its wake causes drag. Delay the separation with dimples, and voila: less drag. How much time will you save? Rocket Science tested the bottle with aero guru John Cobb, who found a quarter-pound drag reduction, or about a 53-second savings over 40K, at 30 miles per hour. At just $10 it's worth a try.

Rocket XP Wetsuit Review

The March Issue of Triathlete Magazine had our Rocket XP Wetsuit reviewed and I wanted to re-hash the comments made about our suit. But first, I want to clarify some of our technology so that you may better understand how different our suits really are from the rest.

Brad Culp is the tech editor for Triathlete Magazine and is great to work with. You really have to appreciate a person who is constantly having products thrown at him to test and write about.

Marcin set out to design our Rocket XP from the ground up. First, we spent more time and money designing and perfecting the welded seam so that there would be no chafing threads on the inside of the suit. Marcin was able to find and build our suits without losing the stretchiness at all these panel junctions. It is the most stretchy welded seams I have ever felt.

Next we looked at the neoprene. Again Marcin stepped up and sought out materials from other industries and figured out a way to laminate Yamamoto's super low drag SCS coating onto a non-neoprene material on the inside of the BLT panels in the legs of our Rocket XP to make them 55% more buoyant than standard neoprene and 30% more buoyant than 5mm of the top of the line available to the industry!

The SCS coating Yamamoto uses on their top end neoprene is the gold standard for low drag neoprene surfaces. How we make our Rocket XP even faster and lower drag than that is with the utilization of the "v" shaped vortex generators on the lower back of our suit (see picture below). We are the first in the industry to use this technique. It is because Marcin has a background in aerospace engineering that we have and are able to apply his knowledge to make groundbreaking products. It also helps that he has been a competitive swimmer and triathlete, thus giving him a good base to try and figure out how to make things better.

Before quoting the review, I would like to post the comments made to me by Brad via email immediately after he tested our wetsuit. The timing of getting our wetsuit to him couldn't have been better because ours was the very last one for him to test, so he knew how it could compare to everything else. I also spoke to him right before testing so I could point out for him to pay specific attention to the special buoyancy panels in the legs (the ones I mentioned are 30% more buoyant than 5mm of the top of the line).

Here is what Brad had to say:
"Both Jay and I noticed the leg panels the minute I threw it on -- very nice touch. I like the very low-key arm catch panels too. Some wetsuit makers use these elaborate designs on the catch panel and all it does is cause you to carry a lot of air into the water -- very nice work!"

Triathlete Magazine March 08 Review
"Darren Zielinski at Rocket Science Sports assured us that the seamless design makes the Rocket XP the toughest wetsuit on the market. We took that as meaning we had an open invitation to beat the crap out of the suit, and we did. The suit truly stood up to the test. Aside from being able to withstand any amount of tugging and pulling without splitting, the seamless suit fits extremely well and optimizes range of motion through the arms and shoulders."

Cheers!