The Second "Race" of the Weekend: Tour de Cure

On Friday and Saturday I competed in the Madison to Chicago Ragnar Relay and pleased with how I ran.  I guess a lot of extra sleep can do wonders for my running times.

The Ragnar Relay sign

Race bib and medal.  This was my first orange bib and medal.

My team finished around noon, so I got back to where I live in the mid-afternoon.  It was just enough time to take a nap, get a few things organized for my trip to Iowa, and then go to bed early. 

Sunday morning I woke up at 5:30 to get ready for the Tour de Cure Chicagoland metric century bike ride.  The ride began at 7:30, but I had to put my bike on my car, pick up a friend, and then get to the start line.  Amazingly, I was not too tired. 



Did you know a metric century is 62 miles?  I learned that many people do not know this!  However, the course was long, so I rode 65 miles. 

 This was the first bike ride that I've ever done.  I've done a duathlon, but never something purely bike-related.  My "training" for this ride was 1 ride of 50-miles the weekend before.  Originally I was going to do the 30-mile course, but my friend wanted to do the metric century and I wanted to do it with her.  Plus, it was a new challenge. 

If you are not familiar with the Tour de Cure, if you have diabetes than you can be a Red Rider.  All Red Riders are participants that have diabetes.  Therefore, I was a Red Rider.  You couldn't see my jersey because it was so cold that I wore a running jacket over it. 

My jersey looked like this, except it had Chicago on the side, and not Colorado, as this jersey does.

I do ride with diabetes!  And run with it!  And live with it!

During the ride my blood sugars were stuck in the 50s and did not want to come up, no matter how much I ate and didn't bolus.  I am not the model diabetic, and I know many people could not do this, but I can still exercise decently when in the 50s.  I might not have the fastest times, but I can still do average.  If you looked at me, you wouldn't be able to tell that something was off. 

The race had many rest stops, and I tested and consumed food at all of them.  Each time I tested I was between 51 and 66 and ate 20 carbs.  I think the amount of exercise I did the past two days, paired with the long duration of the bike ride, did my blood sugars in.  It was not until Sunday night that I finally came up, at which point I went straight to the 200s. 

(Writing about a bike ride is far different than writing about a race...I just feel like there is not much to share!)

The most eventful part of the ride was when I got a flat tire at mile 40.  I know nothing about pumping air in my bike tires, let alone fixing a flat.  Luckily, a guy pulled over and did everything for me.  He was super nice and tried to explain everything he was doing to me.  I think I comprehended about 40% of what he said.  I speak running, not biking.

The ride finished, rather uneventfully.  They raised over $220,000 for diabetes.  I did notice that not many riders were wearing Red Rider jerseys.  I thought that many more diabetics would ride.  Maybe a lot did the shorter 30 or 15 mile distances instead?  

After getting back to my place, I promptly got in my car and drove 3.5 hours to Iowa.  As I drove, I thought about the distance my legs had carried me the past weekend.  The body can do amazing things.