An example of being a diabetic runner

I don’t spent enough time talking about what it is to be a runner who is a diabetic.  Truth be told, this is because it doesn’t affect me nearly as much you’d think.  I wake up, take a pill, eat breakfast and go about my life the same way you go about yours. 

Well today I was acutely reminded of my status as a diabetic.  You see, I’ve decided to drop a few pounds; and of course, I’ve gone a little overboard in the past 2 days (having lost over 2 pounds).  So naturally, when I got halfway through my 10k run today, I had no energy left.  Joy.  Here’s what happened.

When I started my run at 12:30pm, it was 17c and cloudy.  Unbeknownst to me, the calorie deficit that I created had left my muscles with precious little glycogen in reserve.  The only significant amount of glycogen in my body had come from the 500ml of Gatorade that I drank before my run.  When I started my run (in Sutherland, a neighborhood in Saskatoon), I felt like it was probably going to be an off day, but that happens, doesn’t it?

I didn’t bring my headphones with me because I think that music is distracting me from paying attention to work I’m doing when I’m out running.  Yes, I said work.  I don’t like the distraction a phone and headphones makes.  Did you see Meb fiddling with Runtastic during the Boston Marathon?  Even better, does Meb ever drop his phone during a race?  No… because he probably doesn’t bring it with him. (*yes, believe it or not, I’ve dropped my phone twice during races).

Saskatchewan has such unbelievably flat terrain, you could probably see for hundreds of kilometers were it not for tractors, barns, and the occasional Tim Horton’s obscuring the horizon.  There’s a 500 meter bike path that runs along Circle Drive in Sutherland, with one end near 108^th Street East.  I do a few out and backs here and quickly realize that I have no speed today.  Yes, the 10lbs of ankle weight I ran with yesterday have made today’s run a bit harder since some of my muscles are still a tad bit sore.

The bridge over Circle Drive is half bridge and half overpass, but my first word to describe it is bridge.  Interesting.  Once over the bridge, I proceed to run along 108^th for a bit and then enter the University of Saskatchewan campus and run along Research Drive.  Right as I reach the 4k mark, I begin to feel my energy rapidly diminishing.  Suddenly my muscles have mutinied and are actively betraying me, and my body comes to a halt at the 4.4k mark.   I have two loonies and a quarter with me, which isn’t enough to buy much on a college campus, so I forgo the campus’s Tim Hortons in favor of running a direct route back to the apartment, which is (of course) 5k away.  Naturally no one, no matter how messed up they are, is going to end a run at 9.4k unless they absolutely have to. 

It is then that I realize that I’m carrying the glucose tablets.  I chew the first, and nothing happens.  I try to run, but don’t get far before my body grinds to inaction. I then take the remaining three tablets, and within a minute I am in possession of genuine energy.  I’m also in a precarious position.  My blood sugar is certainly very low, and if I don’t get my blood sugar up, I am in big trouble.  My options: walk home and hope I arrive quickly enough.  Run home and burn more energy, but arrive sooner.

Ultimately, I decide to run home at a 10:30/mile pace.  Fast enough that I’ll get home twice at quick as walking, slow enough that I’m not burning crazy amounts of energy. And so I set off, soaked in sweat, and ran along Research Drive towards 108^th Street East.  When I walk into the apartment I’m seeing stars, the middle of my vision is almost black.  I immediately start drinking Gatorade and make a bowl of oatmeal with whey protein.  Crisis averted.  But seriously.

As dismaying as it is to come back from a run with hypoglycemia, I got some insight into what it’s like to actually run out of energy on a run… you know, what it is to hit the wall.  And rest assured that it sucks.  It sucks badly, in fact.  But a few glucose tablets gave me the energy to run for another 30-something minutes.   In a strange way, I look forward to hitting the actual marathon wall at the Queen City Marathon in September.  It’ll be an experience.

Race Updates!

Another beautiful day in Saskatoon.  In light of my recent 5k performances, I'm going to upgrade to the 10k at the StarPhoenix Bridge City Boogie 8 race on June 8th.  To be perfectly honest, I've reached a temporary ceiling running 5000 meters, so if I want to do significantly better, I need to train differently (and I'm not going to see those results by June 8th).  That said, I feel like I could potentially get a PR at the 10k event--this would be only my third 10k race, and I seemed to have a lot going against me in the previous two attempts at that distance (in both cases: SI Joint pain, lack of sleep; and in one case, having raced the previous day in a different city).
And this all segues perfectly into my next announcement.  I am now registered for the Lace up for Diabetes Saskatoon 2014 5k race in late August.  I fully intend to actually do specific training for this race. Including improving my anaerobic running, the muscular strength in my calves and losing some weight.  Interestingly, I've got my first marathon two weeks later.  Fun.
One last item I want to mention.  If you haven't tried oatmeal with protein, you definitely should.  I tried it for breakfast just to get a sense of what it tastes like--after all, oatmeal is a terrific way to start the day, and protein promotes a feeling of fullness.

Saskatchewan Marathon Day Photos

Check out the Recap page for the official race recap.

The Saskatchewan Marathon Expo

Today was packet pick-up day at Prairieland Park for tomorrow's big race. That's right, folks, the Saskatchewan Marathon is tomorrow.  I'm running the 5k event, which is probably a good thing as I'm still on the mend.  My next half marathon will be in June, with another to follow in July.  But for now I get to cut my teeth on another 5k.

The Team Diabetes folks even had fake tattoos (not pictured here), in addition to stickers. Brainsport was on hand... selling some interesting gear.  I got the marathon hat... 

Kind of interesting that they brought the start/finish line to the expo.  Does that normally happen?

This part was a little weird since no one seemed to care about the guest speaker.

Canadian humor.

Ten Races I want to Run Before I Die

The first person to run a marathon actually died after doing so.  No word on his time.   Before I die, though, I have a few races I want to run.  This list is current as of May 21, 2014.

1. Antarctica Marathon
2. New York Marathon
3. Boston Marathon
4. RnR Las Vegas Marathon
5. Dubai Marathon
6. North Korea Marathon (or Pyongyang Marathon)
7. Any Ninja 5K
8. Shakespeare Half Marathon
9. Queen City Marathon [Scheduled for 9/7/2014]
10. Midnight Sun Fun Run (Inuvik, Northwest Territories).

Honorable mentions: Yelloknife Marathon, Mayo Midnight Marathon (note: I hate mayonnaise).

New shoes: Brooks Pure Cadence 2

I'll just go ahead and say that although I've only logged five kilometers on my new shoes, they feel terrific. I bought them at Running Room in Saskatoon for c$85 -- that's $100 + $10 (GST/HST) - $25 (Running Room gift card for winning the Transplant Trot 5k).

The shoes have a slanted back foot, which promotes a mid/front foot strike. Thus, during my impromptu running session this evening, I had my fastest training run ever.

The things I think about when I run

Running path on the Meewasin Trail in Saskatoon.

Sometimes when I run on the streets of Forest Grove I'll catch the smell of meat cooking on a propane grill behind the opaque fence of some house I'll never visit.  The smell is borne of the meat, and it snakes over the fence slowly like a cloud until it reaches my nose and I breath it.  It originated from the thing it smells like, and as I run through it, I try to focus on the fragmented memory it evokes--of a time long ago, when I was a boy at summer camp, the hot days, the hot dogs, the unpalatable smell of chlorine, the fresh dirt kicked up by my tennis shoes and the thrill of a Friday night camping away from home.  All these things fit together perfectly and rationally in this fragmented memory, (a once perfect memory). And yet it's hard to know exactly what I've forgotten, or why my neural pathways choose to remember the scent of grilled hot dogs; and not, for example, where I left my blood sugar meter.
My summers at camp are such a surprising thing to think about as I run on the winding streets of the neighborhood.  
One thing I do to get myself through runs if I'm tired is to imagine I'm nearing the end of a marathon.  In this reverie there are lots of friends, former coworkers and maybe even some neighbors--all of whom are genuinely surprised at my running ability.  I've never bothered to analyze these waking dreams.
I never dream of running when I sleep. 
When I would run along the East River in New York City, I would often distract myself by listening to sports radio.  Sometimes I would listen to podcasts as I crossed the Williamsburg Bridge into Brooklyn.  (My god, that bridge was tough.)  It's really too bad that the bridges here in Saskatoon are not suspension bridges.
Where I am doesn't seem to matter too much.  Even when I've run in the desert, the basic reality about running does not change. If I don't think about my breathing, for example, it won't be an issue.  I don't often stop to take photos... I don't often stop at all.  I like to maintain the intensity all the way through the run.
If my muscles are too tight, I try to focus on just putting one foot in front of the other.  It's weird, but sometimes I almost feel like I need a warm-up run for my recovery run.
Sometimes I think about the street I'm running on.  Right now many of the streets in Western Canada (particularly in northern cities like Saskatoon and Edmonton) still have dirt and sand on them.  It's not particularly attractive, but it keeps my mind active for a few seconds.  Sometimes I think about previous races.  The Saskatoon Police Half Marathon was my least pleasant because of the knee pain (which caused me to finish at 2:19).  The Chilly Half Marathon, despite being insanely cold (-17c), was actually the most fun.  The interminable walk from my hotel to the Pizza Hut was probably a bad idea after the Chilly Half Marathon.  I must have spent an hour walking on Guelph Line, freezing the entire time.
Saskatchewan is colder than Ontario, of course, but the chill of the cold in Ontario near the water is absolute.  
If I'm running in the cold (say, anything colder than -8c), then I'll probably reflect of my runs over the Williamsburg Bridge at least once.  Perhaps the thing I didn't like about the bridge was the rows of people I sometimes had to swerve around.  They always seemed to walk so slowly and devoid of purpose.  On the Manhattan side the bridge let out onto Delancey Street.  Sometimes I'd head east on Delancey, down a vaguely steep decline until reaching the foot bridge over the FDR Drive, and keep running along the East River Path.
I wonder if my mind would be able to function if I were to run in conditions colder than -20.  
Right now, thankfully, the temperature hovers between 2 and 10c, which is very good for running.

I'm not precisely sure what else I think about when I run.  Usually it's the events of the day or something along those lines.

Summer Reading: Haruki Murakami

What I Talk About When I talk About Running by Haruki Murakami 

 It's surprising to find out that a gifted novelist is also a serious runner. The title of Murakami's book marries one of my favorite activities (running) to one of my least favorite authors (Raymond Carver). The book is, of course, about more than running. Lurking below the surface is a meditative exposition on aging and just being alive. Murakami's rich prose evokes an almost precise feeling that I've tried to imagine before, that of how ones body begins to breakdown. For him it was manifest in not having that certain gust of energy near the conclusion of a marathon. I wonder what my own signs will be? In truth my body and my age are headed in different directions right now. As my fitness level increases, I feel younger and more capable. I expect to hit a ceiling at some point in the future where my body ceases to improve... But until that happens I won't be worrying about it.  

[available from Amazon.ca and Amazon.com]

The latest from the trail

And so it would seem that I must buy new running shoes. Thanks for my pelvis and hips being properly aligned now, my running gait has changed and my Brooks (in which I've probably logged about 275 to 300 kilometers while running) are now retired since they are molded to my old gait.  My Saucony's are probably finished as well.  It's all good, since I can put my gift certificate to Running Room to good use.

My next pair of shoes will be used primarily for the Manitoba Half Marathon, River Run Classic Half Marathon and training for the Queen City Marathon.  And so I will need to start breaking them in within the next week or so.

So the question now is: how much has my running gait changed?  What will that mean in terms of the type of shoe I now need?

Coffee Crisp McFlurrys, Running Room Gift Card and a new Bike!

I'm not sure if this is Canada-wide, but it would seem that McDonald's has shaken up the ever popular market for junk food with its Coffee Crisp McFlurry.  As you know, your body uses a great deal of glycogen when you run long distances--as such, it doesn't quite hurt as badly when you can use this as an excuse for having a McFlurry.  And hey, my blood sugar is under total control, so yeah... the Coffee Crisp McFlurry happened.  Too bad it sucked...

In other important news, I still haven't figured out what to use my $25 Running Room Gift Card on.  I might add that I got the gift card for winning a 5k, so using it on candy bars isn't the direction I want to take it.
Lastly, I have a bicycle now... yes!  That means I'll be doing plenty of cross training.

Ten things I didn't have to give up to be a runner

1. Ice cream
2. Iced Coffee
3. Cheezies
4. My cardiovascular fitness
5. Love life
6. My Hollister shirts
7. Alone time
8. My sanity
9. My social life
10. My money

A beautiful day in Saskatchewan for a win

2014 Saskatoon Transplant Trot
Victoria Park, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Distance: 5K
Time: 24:33
Rank: 1/100
Post race meal: Green apple Gatorade, Arby's Roast Beef!, Tim Horton's Iced Coffee and Cinnamon Bun

Comments: Well, it's nice to win one.  Course was the opposite of flat, but that was okay, since the lack of flatness worked to my favor, and against *everyone* else.  The result, I got the gold.
Otherwise, Jasmine and I had quite a lot of fun on what was a pretty exciting day.   I ought to note that I did break the cardinal rule of racing, and tried two new things on race morning.  For one, I drank Gatorade (as opposed to Crystal Light), and this seemed to help a bit.  And I also used Kinesiology tape for the first time and taped the side of my knee.  I gotta tell you, it sure felt great not to be bothered by my knee... especially on a course like this one.

Tomorrow's Transplant Trot

My next race is tomorrow morning.  Weather forecast calls for subfreezing temperatures in the morning, though it'll be around 5c by race time.  I don't foresee a new PR happening tomorrow.

Marathon training, week 1

5/6

For the first time in months I feel almost extraordinary after running. I did 6k on the treadmill at nine minutes per mile (sorry folks...but I track my distance using the metric system and my speed using the imperial system). I feel pretty good, my IT band didn't give me trouble; and at the end of it I had a nice good sweat going. But here's where it gets interesting. For the first time, I did a yoga session immediately after I finished running. It was a little weird honestly, but you know what? I got a pretty good stretch session in. Above all: I stretched.


5/8

Did 5k today and yesterday. Easy runs. Yesterday I did a 9:30, 8:30 and a 7:30 mile on the treadmill. Felt pretty good.

Today I ran outside--very easy run. 10:00 miles. Pretty stiff wind. Stiffness in my left piriformis muscle kept my pace slow.


5/9

Rest day. Iced coffee, cheezies and relaxation. Since Dharma doesn't have pre-k today, I made Magic Shells and magic hot dogs--truth be told, that's two days in a row of the same lunch. My next race, the Saskatoon Transplant Trot, is coming up on Sunday. It's a 5k race, though I won't really be racing per se. Afterwards I intend to do another 5k. As for Saturday, I'm going to cross train.

 

Ten things I gave up to be a runner

1. Sleeping in on the weekend (Saturday is a long run or Sunday is a race. Sometimes both are races).
2. Diet coke.
3. Drinking alcohol (nothing beats that dehydrated feeling).
4. Cheeseburgers.
5. Being overweight.
6. Nicotine.
7. 90% of my social life (see #3).
8. Most of my work and all of my formal attire (see #5).
9. Thai food*.
10. That bored feeling on Saturday morning I used to get.

*Believe it or not, I lost my taste for Thai after I started running seriously.

Day One of Marathon Training

Okay everyone, today is day one of my 18 week marathon training program.  I intend to follow Hal Higdon's 18 week program with minor modifications.  You can view the plan here.  I intend to participate in several 5K and Half Marathon races here in Saskatchewan, as well as in Manitoba over the next few months.  I haven't scheduled any races for August, though this may change.  The marathon I am training for is the Queen City Marathon in Regina, Saskatchewan on Sunday, September 7th.  It is my first marathon, and my goal is to finish. Ideally I would finish in under 4:30, but I will be thrilled to finished in under 4 hours.

I didn't train coherently for my first half marathon, I just went out and ran the distance and finished in under 2 hours. Luckily my body was prepared and strong enough for the pounding it took.  Still, if I had maybe done proper training, I might have been able to finish a good ten minutes faster.

In the run up to my second half marathon, I was beset with an IT band injury.  As a result, I did a total of 4 long runs and almost nothing else in the month before the race.  Thus, when I crossed the finish line at 2:19, I wasn't surprised.  In fact, I boldly predicted my finish time just a day before the race: "So my prediction, unfortunately, is that I am going to finish in 2 hours and 20 minutes."

Okay, now that I've gotten all that out of the way... 

I did some light stretching, foam rolling and yoga (I'll post some links/videos later so you can see).  Today is a non-running day, but it is not an off day as there is much to do.

My job now is to rebuild the endurance I've lost because of my SI Joint injury (which played a big part in the IT band pain). What's really hard to cope with is that my leg muscles, which seemed wholly capable of conquering 21k back in March, are now suddenly unable to handle the pounding.  But that's about to change.

I'm rebuilding.  This time I'm going to do everything the right way.

Every day is like Sunday

I've spent the day reading Haruki Murakami's What I talk about when I talk about running.  It's quite an interesting read considering that I didn't realize that Murakami is both novelist and runner--you can see how true this is from the photo below.

I was slated to run a 10k trail race today, but opted out when I realized that what I really need today is a slow and easy run, and not another substandard performance.  So yes, I'm not pushing myself beyond what's actually rational and reasonable any more. In fact, I'm still recovering about 1.5 hours of body-weight exercises on Saturday (100 crunches, 54 push-ups, 50 lunges, unknown # of squats and so forth).  Instead of running the race, I walked a few blocks with Jasmine and the kids... one of the kids insisted on wearing her Halloween costume.  So yeah, that happened.  They really couldn't be cuter if they tried.

And I still haven't run yet today... Hmmm.

Update: Is it me or are ice baths a form of torture?  I'm writing to you *from* an ice bath having just run 6 kilometers.  Today the pace was faster than last time--a fact I attribute to actually fueling up.  I'm still not really happy with my stride.  Though I had no trouble with my IT band today--had I tried running faster I probably would have aggravated it.  All in all, I ran 9:35/mile splits, and felt perfectly fine.  So I'm improving.  With a bit more time, I'll regain some of the speed I lost.

Running News round-up: Broken legs, Breezes, and Gu fail.

• Yikes: Runner finishes Banque Scotia 21k de Montreal with a broken leg! [See the youtube video.] According to the Embrace Running podcast, the athlete had to have surgery after the race.  Question: Would you have kept running with a broken leg?
• Terrific article about fueling for your first marathon. 
• Wow, so Meb is running the RnR San Diego Half Marathon on June 1. Even better, he is also pacing the 1:30 group.
• Whats-her-name Chicago Marathon winner Liliya Shobukhova got banned for doping.
• Runner's world reviews the Runkeeper Breeze app. "A new app from RunKeeper tracks the exercise you get when you’re not running—without eating your phone’s battery life."  Would be interesting to see if this will ever be available for Android devices.
• Saskatoon Road Runners Association is screening "Spirit of the Marathon II" on May 12th.  Doors open at 6pm. 
• According to Wikipedia, the origin of the "marathon" comes from a messenger who ran to Athens from the battle at Marathon to give word that the Persians had been beaten. Pheidippides (that was the guy's name) died after completing his task.  He probably should have fueled up with Salted Caramel Gu. 
• The folks at Ebay need to work on their search algorithms. 
• 

Do you have running news you want mentioned here?  If so, drop me a line at johninsask (at) yahoo.ca.

... And somehow the day ended at McDonald's

And so, faced with a need to unburn the 400-500 calories I needlessly burned running today, I took advantage of a trip to McDonald's--which I'm sure Meb, Ryan Hall, Shalene Flanagan and all the other gods of running do on a daily basis.  I should point out here and now that, aside from my beautiful girlfriend, I live with two kids.  Want to guess how much they love the playground at McDonald's?  If you guessed "more than anything else in the known universe," you would be correct.  Normally, though, I don't order fries, McFlurry and a diet f-ing coke; in fact, I don't order anything, save for the occasional unsweetened iced coffee.  (note: despite the poor food choice this evening, my postprandial blood sugar was only 127).

Today's run was interesting as I didn't have any real running fuel, and didn't have the time to get any either.  So I fueled up on a potato scone. Shockingly, I didn't have a particularly good run. 33 minutes and 5.5k.  The pace was deliberately slow, of course; but the point was really just to get my body used to running everyday again (given the lack of continuity in April).

This was another run through Forest Grove. The temp was a fairly warm 20c.

This was an interesting little path from the park to a nearby street.

On another note, the Saskatchewan Marathon is 24 days away!  I'm running the 5K event, thankfully.  Not sure how competitive I'm going to be.  But we shall see.