Another lesson learned

I am going to go ahead and call my weekend, "The Worst Race Weekend, Ever".

To recap...

Drove down to Orlando to meet up with Janine from Abbott so she could hook me up on the Freestyle Navigator continuous glucose monitor. The resort she was staying at ended up being located in the depths of Disney World. Disney World was ridiculously hard to navigate your way through because all the roads are really windy, they fork a million times and all lead to places like, "magical fantasy land!" and "princess park!".. after cursing up a storm in my car, driving circles, and trying to get my iPhone to give me directions, I made it to her room. Only about 1 hr and 20 min late. After 2 hrs of Navi training, finally got hooked up! I seriously have been so excited about getting the Navigator for months and was really glad to finally have the dang thing to help me manage the diabeetus a bit better.

After gettin' Navi'ed up, I ended up meeting up with Phil and Joe who were down there at the AACE conference and we went to dinner with the folks from Abbott. I got a steak, it was awesome.

Friday, slept in and ended up going for a 2 hr ride. By the time I woke up, the Navigator was ready to be calibrated, and I was able to use it on my ride. LET ME TELL YOU, it was epic! It was awesome to be able to see finally what exactly is going on with the BG while out training. On a side note, another bad thing about Orlando is it's so big and sprawling, you never feel like you leave the city, I felt like I was always in a congested area and having to stop every 1/4 mile for a traffic light.

Alright, Saturday was a criterium in Lakeland. Things with the Navi were going great, it was accurate and my fingers were glad to have a break from being poked all the time. The weather here in FL has been getting real hot & humid and that combo did not really agree with the Navi's sticky-ness. 20min before the start I am sitting at 140, solid! go roll around a bit, and 10 min before the start I get an arrow pointing straight down, so I eat 2 GU's. At the start line the arrow is still pointing straight down, so I drink a dex 4 liquid thing. 20 min into the crit I am kinda feeling crummy and my legs feel real nasty. Check the Navi and the arrow is point down at a 45 degree angle, eat another GU. 30 min into the crit I am just dying and feel like I am going to yak on everyone in the race. I drop out. Check the navi it says 160 arrow straight across. :/ Roll over to the car and grab the Omnipod and check, it just says "High"..over 500... fantastic! Upset because I just dropped out of another race because of poor management and I am 500, I rip off the sensor and throw it into a dumpster by registration. Basically I learned that if the Navi is not stuck on real well and is able to jiggle about it doesn't work out so well. The lesson also learned is that I shouldn't rely completely on technology. I should have realized that when I started feeling like my legs were real achey 20 min into the crit, that it was because my BG was heading up yonder. If I have to, I can race at 300, but not 500.

After the race, drove the 50 min back to Orlando thinking about how I really need to use some more common sense when it comes to managing my diabetes and headed to my friend's condo. We headed out to dinner to this really crazy western bar/restaurant and got to walk by Club Paris Hilton, no joke! It was also really crazy looking. Before bed, I decide I am going to put on another sensor and just strap that sucker down with duct tape. Only problem is, I chucked out the transmitter that was attached to the sensor back in Lakeland. Just wasted $300 and now I am back to managing my diabetes old school.

Sunday.. 2008 state criterium championships in downtown Lakeland. So once again the FL summers are starting to crank up, heat & humidity also don't mesh well with Omnipods. 20 min before the start it falls off. Luckily I have plenty of time to put another one on. Put the new one on, check I am 220, bolus .5 unit and roll around for about 10 min. Check at the start line, I am 240. bolus .75 unit. As the crit gets going my legs start feeling totally loaded up, and I know I am totally f-ed. I know racing when your BG is high, is totally mental to a point but once I get over 350, I am just done. As you may have guess, 2nd race in a row I have dropped out of. Check and I am 413.

This whole weekend just screwed with my head and cracked me a bit. Training & racing have been going pretty well and this weekend just shook up how positive things have been going. Going into this weekend I was totally excited about having a go at the state crit and really happy because I found out that I have guest spot on Advil-Chapstick for Nature Valley. After dropping out of 2 races and losing the Navigator that I had been wanting for sooo long, it was just plain crappy! It was all totally my fault too which made it all that worse.

Alright, my complaining is over! But basically, driving the 4 hrs home gave me a lot of time to think and I am going to turn this weekend into a learning experience and quit crying about how bad I did. Sometimes living, training, and racing with diabetes is like knocking your head into a brick wall and you want to throw your hands up into the air and say f- it! I definitely came close this weekend, but realized I was being a baby and need to get over it, everyone has issues they have to deal with.