You are the top coach and cheerleader, Eric.
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Fantastic run! Congratulations to the both of you!! 
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Way to go! Diabetes demands much more mental fluidity and resiliency of us, but as someone who shares the âberserker-screamâ (love that phrase) approach to dealing with challenges and has had to make many of the same adjustments you are, let me just say youâre doing an exemplary job.
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you are all the best cheer squad a girl could ask for! i am writing up a full debrief of what happened race day, including my successes and areas for improvement (many notes of both kinds!).
meanwhile, as i work on that, enjoy this little training and race day finish montage.
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Pandamania 10K Time Trial: Post-Race Debrief
We began on Saturday with a 7:30 departure. We crossed the pass and got to my parentsâ place about 2.5 hours later, and spent the day there. It was rainy, so we took Mara for a short neighborhood walk and otherwise just sort of chilled out. The food situation was excellent and I didnât really have any BG issues.
Race day kicked off Sunday with a 5:30 alarm that didnât quite succeed in getting me moving, so I got off to a behind-the-eightball start. (I was running about 15min behind.) I scrambled to pull together my oatmeal and coffee, and decided I was just going to have to eat and drive at the same time. Luckily I caught a break on traffic and mostly made up the 15 minutes on the road to get back on track. This was a Just-In-Time kind of day!
Unfortunately! Another hiccup: the race start was right next to the Everett Naval Station, which my Google nav is familiar with because we usually handle any on-base tasks there. (For anyone who missed this detail earlier, Iâm a surviving Air Force spouse, and consequently do have base access privileges: I think Google saw an on-base road that appeared to lead right next door to the marina, probably has something tethered to my saved locations on-base, and tried to route me that way.) When my directions to race parking started trying to send me through the gate onto base (LOL) I had a minor freakout. I was still feeling frazzled over the minor hiccup with timing, and now I felt lost and lied to by my GPS! I simply couldnât believe that going on base was correct, so I called my friend in a panic and she confirmed that no, I should not trust Google but should instead proceed six blocks past base and turn into the Marina. Ultimately all is well that ends well and we managed to locate our parking and our friend (who had picked up my packet for me on Saturday), Mara promptly took a dump in the parking lot yay, and we got into the starting chute with about 5 minutes to spare.
My BG at the car was 158, which I attribute to stress. But we got in the chute in time, and the gun went offâŚ.
âŚand we got moving and things immediately improved! The most stressful part of racing for me is usually getting to the starting line - I relax a ton once the rubber actually meets the road. My sugar was running lower than I expected throughout this event (maybe I got all my stress out beforehand?!)
At about mile 1.5, all the excitement caught up to Mara and she signalled me that we needed to pull over for another bathroom break for her. Of course, at just this moment a pack of marathoners with their pacer was barreling up behind us!!! I had immediate visions in my head of us ending up with Mara assuming the position right in their way! We managed to hop off to the side in time and into the ditch for her to make her deposit: I hope those marathoners appreciated it! I had to scramble down into said ditch to collect, but we were pretty quickly back on the go.
I had some gear and technical difficulties as well. My watch refused to record an outdoor run, so I had to record it as an indoor workout. The meter and strips (the side that goes in the meter is whatâs exposed to the air) were struggling with the temperature (early on: it warmed up fine), and the salt and moisture in the air so near Puget Sound seemed to dirty up the strip ends. I lost some time debugging and struggling to get a reading off the Contour. I ultimately managed to get it working, but this required a couple brief stops to handle the error codes and clean off strips so they could be read by the Contour.
Sugars as follows:
Parking Lot: 158 (still hyperventilating a little from stress of thinking I would miss it!)
Starting Chute (20 min later): 95
15min: 87
30min: 94
40min: 77, 15g fast sugar
50min: 91
Finish (65min): 102
Our final time was 1:05:16. This was very close to what I thought was a realistic time target for this event for me going into it. The weather was spectacular, and we got some good bird watching too! Pintail ducks, wigeons, cormorants, great blue herons, a bald eagle, and a pair of harbor seals graced our last two miles along the waterfront. Sure put a smile on my face, as I now knew for sure we were gonna close this out successfully, we were running basically on pace, and how could you not crack a grin as the morning sun touches the clouds over the saltwater and the local fauna are cheering you on!!!
I finished with gas left in the tank, and I feel certain that the process will go more smoothly next time the morning of. This was the first overnight trip we have done since diagnosis, so it wasnât just the race: it was my first time doing any kind of âtravelâ with Daya B along for the ride. For a first foray outside of our own home and comfort zone, I think things went really well and will be easier next time.
The glucose meter and phone tech difficulties, doggie digestive pyrotechnics, not to mention my morning chaos getting there, all dinged our final result⌠and luckily all are easy ways to pick up huge chunks of time for the next round! It means we can get faster just by getting smoother with our equipment and race day routine⌠in addition to continuing to train for more speed and making gains that way.
My best friend (she totally kicked butt! finished a decent bit ahead of us and is the one who recorded our finish!) and I grabbed some water and granola bars (she has an autoimmune condition requiring her to be gluten free, so the granola bars on offer luckily worked for us both!), I took some insulin with mine, and we sipped coffee and watched the seals and took a little cool-down stroll by the water. I then returned to spend the rest of the day with my parents, and we drove home last night after dinner with them. It was really nice to be able to relax at their place and make sure my sugar wasnât doing anything unexpected post-race before we made the (fairly significant) drive home.
We are excited for our next 10K, the Apple Blossom Run in Wenatchee in May!
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Hey hey SE! Great job on all of this! Really outstanding stuff here. 
The video is tremendous too!
Really happy for you and what you accomplished. Especially for such a short time getting adjusted to the D complexities and everything.
A few things to go through on all of thisâŚ
Your race numbers are great! The 2(ish) hours for breakfast and your bolus amount looks like it hit perfectly for you! 
The drop from 158 to 95 in 20 minutes makes me a little nervous. Just want to make sure we keep an eye on that, because if you are not under as much stress before the race, those numbers might be a little different.
(Going from 158 to 95 is better than going from 105 to 42 
)
Not worrying about that though. The race numbers are stellar! And you see what that 15g did for you, going from 77 to 91 in only 10 minutes while running, right?
Perfect execution yesterday!
I was not thinking about humidity where you were, I was not sure of the race location. I am very sorry about that.
But, I actually have a fix for this.
Meter strips are dicey when it is humid. All meters are affected by that, and the Contour is no exception.
For cold weather, you have to keep it close to your body. I have also used hand warmers next to the meter. But usually if it is over 35, the Contour is okay.
For the humidity, I have something for you to get. I use them for rainy days. Sorry about that, I didnât know you were gonna be so close to the water.
This will probably only be necessary when you are close to the ocean, or itâs a super humid day.
Moisture is the enemy of test strips!
Look for Contour âOn the Goâ individually wrapped strips. They have them on Amazon.
They come in the 15 strip pack, instead of the bigger packs. They are a little more expensive than the strip vials, but you will only need these on certain days.
Each strip is individually wrapped in a foil pouch and it keeps them dry. You just pop it open and test, and as long as you do that within a few minutes, the strip is fine.
Great job yesterday!
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@panda loved the video and the play by play.
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Single wrap strips ordered and on the way! Please donât apologize: I didnât really mention where I would be, location-and-water-wise, and I dropped the ball here a bit for sure. I did know I would be next to the water and simply didnât connect A to B thinking about those exposed strip ends. See?! Easiest way to pick up time ever! Real low-hanging fruit 
practice makes progress! I master something new with this and iterate every single run!
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Love the video, too, and thanks for sharing your experience with Mara as your running mate. Despite a few issues, you had a amazing run with fantastic BGs! Congratulations!!
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So SE,
When you first started this, I think you said something along the lines of wanting to see if you could run again. Knowing that you could do this safely.
From one of your very first posts, you said this:
Along our discussions over several weeks, the first thing was just finding belief in yourself that this could be done.
So the first thing is just a quick check before we go any furtherâŚ
Do you believe?
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Yes. Clap my hands and get Tinkerbell off the floor kind of believe! 
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Peter Pan?
Oh wait, thatâs a different thread. Never mind! 
I have more questions, but thatâs enough for now. Just bask in the joy of your accomplishment.
Perfect numbers:
95, 87, 94, 77, 91, 102
Non-D stuff right there.
Thatâs the kind of thing that gets you kicked out of diabetes forums for only âposingâ as a diabetic. 
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Ready for questions and the next run! 
Enough basking. Time to get back at it!
âŚand unfortunately my autoantibody titers sort of rule out that possibility 
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This is a rest/recovery/healing week. Do some cross-training. Do active recovery like walking, hiking, or some swimming if you have access to a pool.
Letâs see how you are feeling Saturday, maybe a run on that day.
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Letâs get back on it.
| Day: | Date: | Workout: |
|---|---|---|
| Monday | Apr 1 | 3 mile progression run. Start off at 9:50 pace (6.1 MPH), and each 1/2 mile increase your speed by about 0.1 MPH faster. (For this one, you will start at 6.1 MPH and end at 6.6 MPH). |
| Tuesday | Apr 2 | 3 mile run, easy pace |
| Wednesday | Apr 3 | 30 min tempo run (around 6.3 mph, 9:31 pace) |
| Thursday | Apr 4 | 3 mile run, easy pace |
| Friday | Apr 5 | Rest |
| Saturday | Apr 6 | 5 mile run (2 mile warmup, last 3 miles at sub 9:50 pace) |
| Sunday | Apr 7 | Rest |
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Roger that Coach!
Mara and I race again on May 4. We will be running the Apple Blossom Run 10K in Wenatchee. For now, given her age and where I am at, I think 10K is our sweet spot. This may evolve over time.
Wenatchee is closer to home (still a drive, but only 45min each way instead of 3.5 hours and a mountain range each way!), so we can realistically preview this course. We also wonât have to spend a night anywhere which means we will have all the usual comforts of home, and that will take a lot of logistical load off of me. It will be a simple drive there in the morning, run, and come home. Wenatchee is also a town I know pretty well, so I am less anxious about ending up in the right spot. This time the goals are as follows:
- finish safely, uninjured and with good BG control, at 65:15 or better; resolve gear, travel, and biological concerns identified at Mill Town.
- Target time: 60:00
- Reach goal: 58:00
Letâs get at it! Itâs a great day to be alive in the beautiful Pacific Northwest!
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PS: I am still at that really early stage where gains are incrementally huge, which is why the target time drops are so large. I expect the margins to narrow as I gain more experience and burn through the low-hanging time drop fruit (like not stopping to pick up dog doodoo will shave* a good 20sec/mile off my timeâŚ), but for now weâre taking big chunks of time off at once. I am also running these races on a pretty compressed timeline, so in Wenatchee any change is more likely down to better race day and gear management, not necessarily a reflection of improvements made due to training itself. Training impacts will take longer to emerge (months not weeks to have those changes take effect) and I hope they begin to manifest as I use up my novice on-ramp!
*I say âshaveâ, but with such big time numbers I guess I more realistically mean âlop off with a hatchetâ
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I think I will confine these updates to basics/every couple days, or when something of note occurs.
So hereâs the point of interest! I did 3 miles easy on Saturday and 3 miles speed progression on Monday. I went into both runs following a pattern that has been working: I have been starting with fairly low sugar on the expectation that I will spike at the start of the run. Thatâs no longer happening! Instead, both days I ran myself straight into a low. If you look with a discerning eye, I bet youâll spot a new pattern that started on race morning: this looks a lot like that absolute crater I had at Mill Town from parking lot to starting line.
Saturdayâs low resolved quickly, but yesterdayâs was STUBBORN. Easily the lowest and most stubborn low I have had running. I donât know if this change from running high to dropping low is a mental/stress thing, a fitness improvement thing, or just a diabetes thing! I am trying to determine how I need to step back and reconfigure my pre-run insulin and food because this seems like a pattern now instead of a one-off. The plan I had worked when I was spiking out the gate, but now I seem to be running myself the other direction. This may require a strategy adjustment. I am glad I was doing this on the treadmill (better for specific pace work), so I had easy access to everything I needed to deal, including an easy way to call for help if needed.
Progression run stats below.
Apple Run #1: 04/01/2024: No Foolinâ
Start Time: 07:45am PST
Distance: 3.02 mile
Run Time: 28:26
RPE: 8 when really low , 6 when not feeling so low
Start BG: 118
10min BG: 51 
, +sugar
0.9 15g juice box, remaining 0.1 sprayed all over self, no stop, plan to run through
15min BG: 59, still running, bedecked in dried juice
20min BG: 43, no wonder this feels so hard, crap, 40s is scary, so is that trend, hit pause
15g juice box, waiting and watching, donât think I should keep moving until I get out the basementâŚ
Wait 5min, run paused, BG while standing still: 54! Right trend, sugar onboard, letâs gooo!
Restart, 25min BG: 45 
, okay now Iâm mad and we are PandaBerserking the rest of this. Screw it. Itâs like 180 seconds. I ate sugar, it will hit eventually. rage roar
Finish run as written. I do believe I could have executed this better had my sugar not been so low. Run time does not include sugar stop time, only active time.
End BG: 69
15min walking cooldown
Post-cooldown BG: 71
Soooo thatâs my new challenge! Something changed on race morning - I havenât spiked on a run that day or since - and the pattern is starting to become recognizable to me. My old routine wonât work if this is my new pattern. I almost wonder if I cleared some mental hurdle, or possibly if my fitness has hit a marked point of improvement? These runs are feeling easier, and are not pushing my BG up the way they had been.
Also trying to run through at 43 is really unpleasant friends, I do not recommend.
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Hey SE, you got it all figured out.
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Improved fitness means you wonât spike at this intensity. You can still spike, but it will take a higher intensity to cause it.
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The runs are now your ânormalâ. The mental stress is gone.
Both of these are very good things!
Now, looking at the BG details, some questionsâŚ
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You started at 118. What was your BG 15-20 minutes before that? Thatâs super important! Always check that!
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Did you eat breakfast for this one?
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Did you take Lantus before this one, or were you waiting for after?
This drop might be run + basal, or run + breakfast bolus. I would be surprised if that plummet was from no insulin at all in the morning.
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If the drop was from run + basal, consider waiting until after the run to do your Lantus (maybe you are already doing that).
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If the drop was from run + breakfast bolus, consider a little less bolus amount for breakfast .
Regardless of the cause, the fix is a little snack right before you start. About 15-20 grams, and then you hit it.
That 15-20g before starting will do a lot more for your BG than the same amount after you are already in the ditch.
No worries, all good stuff here! Mental fortitude is part of your training!
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I think there are a couple potential solutions. The most basic analysis here is too much insulin:not enough carbs. I think I can tinker with both those levers - more carbs, or less insulin, or a mix - to manage this. It seems like thereâs probably more than one way to skin this cat, but i either need less insulin on board, or more carbs to go with it, or a mix. Learning actively occurring! The most obvious tinkers are adjusting Lantus, or switching up the prerun food plan. I think Iâll iron it out pretty quick!
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