I ran a 10k this weekend. I need to remember that when I sign up for a run and the word “Hill” is in the title, there will be some uphill running!! I can get rather excited about an upcoming event that I forget the actual work involved.
It was a neighborhood run relatively near my house with a relatively inexpensive registration fee. When I say “relatively near” my house, it was in the hills and in a neighborhood the houses are so big they don’t see their neighbors’ houses and where they can ride their horses in the streets without fear of cars passing by.
A little hoidy toidy.
But, great for a run!
I have done enough of these runs to never expect them to start on time. As you know, timing my insulin is critical for me, so I always try to relax about my insulin timing needs when I am at an unfamiliar start line. On Saturday, I checked at the planned start and was 172; they were about 10 minutes late with the start time. All in all, a good place to start.
I also need to factor in the first quarter to half mile of the runs; sometimes my insulin needs would be better served if I could run straight out of the gate but the kids, strollers, dogs, and walkers on the course rarely let that happen. I again need to plan for this and coach myself to relax.
I looked at the elevation map a few days before the run (obviously not before I signed up for the 10k, or I may have instead signed up for the 5k!). Yes, the 10k map is the one on the bottom, looks like two capital Ms side by side.
I know that running uphill on a trail like this one will always encourage my insulin to work amazingly well, so I really didn’t want to start at any number below 150. So 172 was perfect. I had lowered my basal rate an hour before the planned start and had it set to keep on the lower rate for an hour and a half. If they had started on time, it would have meant I ran the first half on the lower basal rate, and the second half at my normal basal rate. Usually this works out fairly well for me.
Looking at the elevation map, I knew I needed to get up that hill at mile four, but I would have been running for three miles already when I got there. Running up or walking up the hill, I knew that was going to take extra energy, so I made sure and ate a few jelly beans after I passed the mile 3 marker, and then I checked again at the top of the mile 4 hill. 162. Phew.
After that, all I needed to do was finish.
You may have trouble seeing the crazy treacherous downhill at mile 5, but that one was scary. They had railroad ties fashioned as steps, but the ground was a little slippery and some people were still trying to run it; that took a lot of concentration to keep myself upright.
And then again there was ANOTHER hill. I swear, I must have forgotten as I ran the leisurely downhill three miles at the beginning that I was going to have to pay for that later…
But then I saw the finish line. Yay! My parents had done the 5k and I knew I was good when I heard them cheer for me. 
After I crossed the finish line, I stopped my stopwatch and checked my blood glucose. 95.
Awesome. Now, onto the important things in life.
Where’s breakfast?
Rock on!