Diary
Deutsche Wienstrasse Marathon, 2nd April 2006
Sat 1st, April, 2006
The German Wine-Road Marathon
Up at 4.00am on Saturday morning, tested sugar level 4.3 mmol/l from the previous night reading of 5.1 mmol/l (I had 14 units of Lantus, 2 units more than normal, reason: just to have a little extra as I won't be doing much i.e. sitting on plane or in a car)
Meal of the day, BREAKFAST, had a bowl of cereal with 6 units of fast acting insulin, I find it takes 1 unit of fast acting to cover 15g of carbohydrate or 1 carb (this will obviously differ from person to person and on what activities you will be doing), it also takes 1 unit of fast acting to reduce my glucose levels by 1 mmol/l approx, therefore if my sugar level was 10 mmol/l I would have had the 6 units to cover my breakfast plus an extra 4 to reduce my glucose level from 10 mmol/l to 6 mmol/l,
Back to Newcastle airport for 5am, tested sugar level at 5.30am reading 4.1 mmol/l, had a small snack just to maintain levels during the day, Newcastle to Heathrow and then on to Frankfurt, finishing with a Vauxhall Astra rent-o-car along the German autobahn to the hotel approximately 20 minutes from Bockenheim,
So where is Bockenheim???? which side of the road do we drive on?? and I think that was the junction we should have turned off at.........
Bockenheim is in the middle of nowhere, so having found it, registered, collected race packs, a free bottle of wine and some spag bol, we decided to do some recky on the course within the Giant marquee tent, somehow I get the feeling there's not been many English in this marathon before... ever!, first plan ask a friendly local, urmmmmm what's "help me I'm English" in German???
Mike: "So this is the German Wine Road Marathon"
Local: "Ya, dis is zee German Mountain Marathon!!"
Mike: "Mountain!!!"
Local: "Ya, Mountain Marathon"
Mike: "Gary you ****"
Gary: "lol, Bring it on;)"
Just like Barcelona I reduced my basal dose of Lantus from 12 units to 8 units
Sunday 2nd, April, 2006
Right just remember take it easy, 4hrs 20mins... take it easy
Morning of the race, got up at 7am, had a bowl of cereal and some eggs with 6 units of short acting insulin,
The idea is to take 1 energy gel every 45 min's or equivalent in bananas or whatever is at the feed stations, testing every hour and if needs be eat slightly more or less....
Race blood sugar readings spot on in between 5 and 7 mmol/l, finished in 3hrs 53mins, sugar level little low 3.9 mmol/l, had already planned to have amino load recovery drink at finish as its extremely important for anyone to re hydrate and take on food ideally within 30 minutes of the race especially when quick recovery is essential, already had powder in water bottle in car, just needed water.
It was quite a lot of amino load probably 80 - 100g of carbohydrate, and I haven't taken on anymore short acting so will test glucose levels after about 20 minutes, would probably expect reading to be higher than usual.
After a quick shower, needed to set off for home as flight was to leave about 3 hours after the finish of the race, sugar level 10.2 mmol/l at car so had 5 units of short acting to bring levels back down, unfortunately had to leave the free wine in the boot for the rent-o-car assistant as couldn't fit it in hand luggage, doh!
Had plenty of time to chill as plane was delayed for 3 hours, missed London to Newcastle connection, had normal basal dose on flight, 12 units of Lantus.... at 11.30pm we found ourselves back once again at the rent-o-car desk, drove back home arriving at Newcastle airport at 3am, dropped the rent-o-car off and went our separate ways, got home at 3.30am.......
So Mike same again next year, lol, 2 down..... 3 too go;)
