I had set out to break my half marathon personal record yesterday, but things didn’t go as planned.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
My (running) week started off well with an early Monday morning interval workout. I ran well enough, taking into account that I ran 23 miles on Friday at a 7:50 pace. But during Monday\u2019s intervals I had stomach cramps. I didn’t think much of it but when I got home, I started feeling terrible. My stomach felt like someone was ripping it out and my head started to hurt, too. \u00a0For 24 hours I couldn\u2019t do anything but sleep. My blood sugar did surprisingly well throughout the day, probably because I didn’t eat anything.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
On Wednesday I felt a little better, and decided to run. I ran 7.5 miles, running the last 2.5 at a 7:15 pace, a little quicker than my half marathon pace. I was happy I did it but it felt much harder than it should of.<\/p>\n
Thursday, the day before the race, I tried to be very careful with my food and checked my blood sugar frequently. I was trying to make sure my blood sugar wouldn’t surprise me on race day. But it did.<\/p>\n
I set an alarm for 5:00 a.m., a half hour before I planned to get up, to check my blood sugar, just in case there was a problem. When the alarm went off and I tested myself, I was very surprised, my blood sugar was 220. I had a long time before the race, so I decided not to panic. I took some insulin and went back to sleep for a half an hour, well at least I tried.\u00a0<\/p>\n
I got out of bed at 5:30, made coffee and checked my blood sugar again. It was 240. I decided not to take any more insulin and wait it out. I got myself ready to go and checked my blood sugar again. It was down to 190.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Okay<\/em>, I thought to myself, everything is under control<\/em>.\u00a0<\/p>\n I got to the race area early, picked up my bib and chip and went out for a mile and a half warm up. I checked my blood sugar expecting it to be down but it was 187.<\/p>\n The race itself was a catastrophe. I started a little too fast but got into a good 7:15 pace, which I thought I could hold through the race. \u00a0I was wrong. I couldn\u2019t relax about my blood sugar and couldn\u2019t make up my mind when I should take my first gel. I decided to take it after 3 miles, but when I got there I decided to wait, scared my blood sugar was still too high. When I reached the 5-mile water station I decided it was safe to take a gel, which my body seemed to need.<\/p>\n As we got closer to the end of the park, towards the beach, I started to feel the wind. It wasn\u2019t too bad and, working hard, I kept my pace up.<\/p>\n After six miles in the park we reached the beach and turned north for a mile. There was a strong southern wind pushing me uncomfortably from behind, so that I felt I needed to stop myself from running too fast. I knew that this meant trouble since we had to run back in the other direction.<\/p>\n When we turned around the wind was so strong I felt I was wrestling my way back. My pace dropped to 8:35. When we got back into the park I tried to get back into my pace but I couldn’t. I tried to keep up a decent pace thinking that maybe by some miracle I would get over it and save the race. At around the 11th mile, I felt terrible. I had no energy. I thought it might just be my blood sugar. Or maybe I was just looking for an excuse to stop. I decided I needed\u00a0to check my blood sugar. It was 187. It wasn’t my diabetes it was just me. I had wasted another minute of the race and I felt dehydrated and fatigued. I continued running at a much slower pace than I wanted but my body wouldn’t go any faster. I finished the race running after 1:40:02.\u00a0<\/p>\n Feeling depressed and exhausted I went to the refreshment area. They were giving out all kinds of things that I don\u2019t eat \u2013 fruit, cookies, and sugary drinks. There was also a beer stand from a local brewery giving away beer. Although I don\u2019t usually drink beer especially not at 10:00 a.m, I decided to give myself a break. I canceled my temporary basal rate, bolused, drank my beer and although the day had not gone as I had planned, I tried to enjoy myself. After all, I did just run another half marathon.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":129,"featured_media":53098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_relevanssi_hide_post":"","_relevanssi_hide_content":"","_relevanssi_pin_for_all":"","_relevanssi_pin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_unpin_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_keywords":"","_relevanssi_related_include_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_exclude_ids":"","_relevanssi_related_no_append":"","_relevanssi_related_not_related":"","_relevanssi_related_posts":"","_relevanssi_noindex_reason":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1501],"tags":[575],"yoast_head":"\n