Rock star on the run

Fear can mess with your head AND your blood sugars.

We only had to run 19 km yesterday (I love being able to say to people “just 19” when they ask how far I ran :D) and just like last week I started the run out with higher blood sugars than I like them to be, except yesterday I didn’t give a BG correction. I knew my blood sugars would gradually come down with the exercise. But about 30 minutes into the run, I decided to check them and they had already come down 5 mmol from when I started. They were 9.1. I knew they’d keep going down, but I just didn’t know by how much. And because last week’s low blood sugars in the middle of nowhere was still fresh in my brain, I panicked. Even though I had sugar tablets and a pancake packed along with me, in addition to my gels, I didn’t want to be put in that situation again. So, I shut off my pump.

Turns out, though, I really didn’t think that decision through all that well. When I shut the pump off, it was before I had taken any of my gels (two in total) and before chomping down on the pancake with just a few kilometres left to go in the run – none of which I bolused for. When the run was over, my blood sugars were back up to 14.4. Ouch.

But, despite that drama, I totally felt like a rock star on the run! I don’t know what got into me, maybe it was the pasta from the night before, or the caffeine from the Midol dose I took first thing, or the fact that I was on such little sleep I kept going faster thinking there would be a bed at the end … or maybe, just maybe, it had something to do with the high blood sugars. It seems the last few runs where my blood sugars have been high, I’ve felt totally Super Katie like – and my legs were darn speedy today. But shhh, don’t tell my clinic leader (who ran her 8th half marathon race of the year yesterday morning!!!) it was supposed to be an LSD run. But hey, I wasn’t alone. There were two others with me who were motoring along at the same speedy clip. And at the end of the day, our average pace was within range … phew! thank you walk breaks 😀

TODAY’S RUN:

• 8:15 a.m. BG before: 14.3
• Distance: 19 km
• Average pace: 7:01 min/km
  
• Average heart rate: 157 bpm
  
• Fastest pace: 4:02 min/km (shhh!)
  
• Time: 2:14:49
  
• Fuel: @ 45 minutes: GU gel. @ 90 minutes: GU gel. @ 115 minutes: 2 bites pancake.
• 11 a.m. BG after: 14.4

The experienced marathoner of our group indicated that we were running at a 4 hour marathon training pace … not bad. And the best thing, both Lori and I kept talking about how awesome we felt running that pace. Now, add 10 or so more kilometres to it and who knows if we’d still be saying the same thing or falling over with fatique. But hey, at least now I’m not so freaked out about running at race pace on race day. Yes, I am justifying it 😀

Oh, oh, oh and what you’ve all been waiting for: The unveiling of the birthday gift:

That’s not birthday boy Super C-boy sporting it, it’s his younger brother Triple R, who’s quite the ham. As soon as Triple R saw the shiny green with yellow spikes, he forgot all about the boxes of Lego and Transformers all around him. In his words, “I’M SUPER DINOSAUR!”