ironguides

I still think there is no perfect race for anyone, which can actually be a good think since we have always something to work at and improve. So considering that many things don’t go as planned on your typical ironman race, throw in being diabetic on the top of that, and I can tell you that my races felt more like “dealing with problems, while moving forward!”

If you have diabetes and plan on racing an Ironman in the future, below is listed some of the problems I’ve faced and how I dealt with it:

1) Hypoglycemia (low sugar levels): That is the number one nightmare of a diabetic on a race. If you have a hypo, at best, you have to slow down to eat, otherwise you risk passing out and even getting into hypoglycemia coma (not enough energy goes into the brain), and consequences can go from a mildly shakiness to brain death. The best way to fix it was to extra gels, or even better, liquid sugar, all in gels flasks, very handy. Each flask would carry around 400kcal of liquid sugar and I would leave one at my fanny pack that I used on the bike (also to carry glucometer and syringes, as below), one at special needs bag on the bike and on the run, and one more at my run bag.

2) Hyperglycemia (high sugar levels): Nightmare number two, and would happen fairly often with all the hormonal and nutrition changes of a race day. The easiest way to fix this problem was taking several pre-loaded syringes of fast-acting insulin on me, leave some at special needs bag and transition bags.

3) Died Glucometer: At most of my 70.3 and IM races, something happened with my glucometer. I’ve ran out of battery, got it wet inside, overheated.  First times it happened my thoughts were “you gotta be kidding me!”, but after a few races in a row, I actually started the race counting that I would need an extra glucometer. To solve this problem I would take 2 glucometer in my fanny pack, and leave one more in my run’s fanny pack, just in case both on the bike would not be enough.  

 Photo: Fanny packs on the bike and tri shorts on the run are used to carry diabetes devices

4) Dropping testing stripes while riding: This can get a bit frustrating. It is not easy to open the stripes container at a pretty fast speed and pick one stripe, close the container and place the stripe inside the glucometer. To help the non-diabetics to visualize this, picture yourself opening an M&M container at 40km/h, with both elbows on your aerobars. At the level I was racing, I could not afford to stop 30-60seconds for every blood test I would do on the bike, so everything had to be done “on the fly”

5) Not enough blood at the testing stripe: This was also a norm. Whenever I would miss the proper place to hit the blood with, or when there wasn’t blood enough, I would need to repeat the whole process again.

6) Contaminated blood sample: Very, very normal to happen. Eat a gel, let some residual product on your finger tips, do a blood test, and voilá, your blood sugar levels will be extremely high! To solve this problem, I would always try to clean my finger tips with water and get it as dry as possible before the testing, either using the wind, or some clothing.

7) Rain: Most of the above situation can get even more problematic when it is raining. Luckily , I only had to deal with rain a few times when racing an IM, basic differences were going the tests at transition areas,  waiting for a dry moment on the bike to test it (I was on the bike for almost 5h after all, it can’t rain all the time!), and stop under some cover on the run 

So when it comes to ironman racing, don’t be afraid to make up your own tricks to get past the problems that they day will throw at you. Keep moving forward, with a positive attitude, it is a long race, and if you are fit, there will be opportunities to stop worrying about problems, and put your fitness in use.

Vinnie