Little Rock Half Marathon, 2014

Stan and Beth, Jackie and Me were the only ones this year
that completed the half this year!

I took this with my cold hand at the finish line on my
thermal blanket.  I was right where I wanted to be during the
race, about 250 ish but as you can see at 9 am, one hour
into the race my blood sugar jumped off a cliff.  I had
to stop at 9:30, just a couple miles from the finish, and
drink 6 Gatorade's and 4 orange slices to try and get
it back.  I was 56 at the finish line.  That's scary.

Monday, March 10, 2014

Jackie and I completed our 6th Little Rock Half Marathon.  I was particularly excited since we got to leave Chloe at Memaw and Granddad's this year.  She's done the kids marathon and helped with Whit, Stella and August during the race the last few years and I thought this year, she would enjoy being on the farm rather in a hotel and in the crowds during the race.  She had a great time at home.

For the record, I packed my chia seeds for the race, I ate what I normally do the night before a 2 hour race, I hydrated, I slept well and I had the normal breakfast and wore my continuous blood glucose monitor like I do for every long distance race.  This year was different.  It sprinkled for the first 1/2 hour, it was cloudy and it dropped from 56 degrees to 38 at the finish line two hours later and we got 2 inches of ice and 2 inches of snow in Birdeye that night.

During the race, I felt fine averaging a 9:45 min mile, which is about right for me.  This was a year that I hadn't trained one time for a half marathon because of all the nutty weather we've had this winter.  When I got to mile 5, my knees hurt going back over the river bridge but they do every time I do this race.  At mile 6, a mile before the Governor's mansion, my blood sugar went off the cliff, literally.  I check the Dexcom sensor every mile, sip water every mile and I had a Shot Block at mile 1 and mile 4.  At mile 6, the arrows were pointing down, I turned the insulin pump off and hydrated, at mile 7 I felt like I was running in quick sand.  That's what it feels like on a bike too, when you have no sugar in your body you literally can't get anywhere, and can't get anywhere fast either.  So I stopped and drank 6 small cups of Gatorade and asked for a coke but no one had any, but they did offer me a donut.  No thanks.  So I finished off the Shot Blocks, 6 to a sleeve with 48 total grams of carbs to make it to the finish line.  My knees didn't hurt but I spent a lot of time at the mile 7 aid station and I did have to stop to use the bathroom, I didn't take the time at the startline like I should have.  Something I had to do this year and haven't in the past is put my pump and sensor in the Aquapac.  Neither can get wet which meant I had to pull that dang thing out of my shorts every mile to read it and stuff it back in.  My abs were sore the day after the race which has never happened before.

So note to self, eat 2 shot blocks per mile which is about 13 grams of carbs.  I think I'll start next year with more training too, just saying!