Sweet Victory

I rolled out the current version of this blog around two years ago with the tagline, "A Type 1 diabetic endurance athlete, unable to find any good blogs about how diabetics handle endurance sports, decides to write his own. Here it is." The thing is, two years ago, I was one of the only diabetic endurance athletes to regularly blog. I'm not anymore, and that's a great thing. Now diabetics can choose from Jamie , Jerry , Erika , Missy and even Sarah (the newest diabetic athlete blog I've found). Now when I read my old tagline, it reads as if I'm disrespecting these writers. Truth is, I don't miss anything any one of them writes and if you're a diabetic athlete, neither should you. So, I've changed my tagline to be "A Type-1 diabetic marathon runner blogs about running, diabetes and life, in no particular order," not because I've changed, but because the world and the Web has changed, which is a wicked cool thing. While I'm wri...

Here's a button that predicts whether you are a dude or a lady based on your browsing history. According to the button, there's an 82% chance that I'm a girl. It must be all the time on the Oprah site...

Hey, I kid because I care . Hey, A’s fans! Don’t forget to show up a little early for tomorrow’s 12:35 p.m. game against the Royals - ’cause it’s MUG Root Beer Float Day ! For the past eight seasons, Oakland’s AL club has scheduled a day to serve up the frosty treats - complete with $15 commemorative mug ($25 for one with a Mark Ellis autograph) - to raise money for a worthy charity. And this year’s beneficiaries of the selling of the sweet treats? The Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, of course. What better way to show support for diabetic children than by slurping up a delicious beverage they would so desperately love to enjoy, yet could kill them if they did. *Disclaimer: Root beer floats will not kill diabetics. If this were true, I would've been dead about a bagillion times now. However, I do think there's a bit of a disconnect between the cause and the execution on this one.

So the day after I returned from the beach was the Xterra Xduro 21k Trail Race in Nottingham, PA. I chose this race for several reasons: 1) With marathon season underway, I try to make sure most (if not all) of my tune-up races are 1/2M or longer. 2) I love trail racing and believe that once the Boston monkey is off my back will do most of my races this way. 3) It sounds cool to say you did the "Xterra Xduro" last weekend. All of that being said... 1) I'm deep into training so I didn't taper for the race at all. 2) As mentioned, the day before the race was hectic, with returning from the beach. 3) The day of the race marked the 4th straight day of 90+ degrees. There was one of those you're-a-moron-if-you-go-to-the-mailbox warnings. Also, the race had a 9am start time, so by the time we finished, it would be hot. 4) I'd never run in Nottingham Park before and had no idea about the course. I showed up at the race early, after getting about six hours of sleep. It...

After a gorgeous one week vacation, this past week nearly broke me. After a monstrous half-marathon last Sunday (race report still forthcoming), this was my week: 1) 3 company dinners. All wonderful, but all quite late. 2) 4 lunch-time runs 3) 2 late nights of swimming (one meet for the kids, one party) on the two nights I wasn't out for work 4) 2 early mornings of running with the wife (who's training for a 5k) 5) 1 eye doctor appt. that went over two hours (However - that's always a scary appt. for diabetics, and yet, I now have avoided eye complications for 24 years running!) 6) 1 blood test for next week's doc. appt. Like I said - this isn't a complaint. These were all necessary things (though I realize the term necessary isn't applied exactly right here), and they were all good things. But let me tell you: I'm wasted. Completely and totally fried. I have a 13 miler tomorrow morning, which will give me nearly 50 miles in the past 7 days (including the r...

Well, back from the beach, where we had a view of the bay and I had enough beers to keep micro-brewers happy for weeks to come. In between, there were many runs, though this one was my favorite . I had a marathon pace workout scheduled that day... I ran 1 mile to the boardwalk and then ran 2 miles down the boardwalk. At the bottom of the boardwalk, I ran into 30 coast guard recruits just beginning their two mile fitness run. By the time I turned around, they had about a twenty second headstart. I decided to haul in as many of them as I could. When I reached their turnaround, only the first three were left in front of me. The extra motivation made it my easiest marathon pace run by far. In my next post, though, you'll learn about my hardest run ever, just yesterday. But first - 200 e-mails I haven't gotten to, yet.

Probably because I'm a diabetic runner, I love learning about (and learning from) great diabetic runners. I've been keeping my eye on Brian Duplechain , who hopes to be the first known diabetic to break four minutes in the mile. Still, the mile is too much of a sprint for a long distance guy like me, so my nod to "best diabetic runner" would have to go to Missy Foy - the first diabetic to qualify for the Olympic Marathon Trials, who has since gone on to great success at the ultra-marathon distance. All of which brings me to my point: Missy just launched a good looking website and has some great insights on her blog . Be sure to check it out!

Last year, I used the FIRST method, running 3 days a week en route to a successful marathon. This year, I'm using a 6 day per week plan. Here's what I've learned so far: 1) Mentally, six days per week is tougher. With the FIRST plan, I started each run fresh. With six days per week, most of the runs involve a first mile where my legs are saying, "Are you kidding me?" 2) My long slow build over the spring was just what the doctor ordered to stay healthy. Though my legs are more tired than they were on FIRST, I'm surprised how injury-free I am at the moment. Only a year ago, I couldn't imagine staying healthy on six days per week of running, but so far, so good. 3) Even though my legs "feel" slower, I'm actually a good amount quicker. This isn't really a fair comparison, as I'd only been running a year when I did FIRST, but my tempo's are roughly 20 seconds per mile faster than last year. I found this particularly interesting becaus...

Tomorrow will be an interesting experiment. I'm off work (yay summer hours!) and am starting the day with a 15 mile run. Several months ago, the wife gave me a gift certificate for a massage at a local spa. Friday afternoon, I'm cashing it in. I was last at this spa a few years ago when I wasn't running. It was a truly glorious hour of my life, but was made somewhat worse when I could barely move the next day (which somehow seemed to defeat the purpose). Now, I'm not sure what to expect. My fitness is way beyond what it was back then. However, running doesn't exactly make you more flexible. And, 15 miles tomorrow morning isn't exactly a walk in the park either. The massage, I'm sure I'll love. But the aftermath? Stay tuned...

We haven't heard much from Halle Berry since she had her baby. This was particularly disconcerting to those of us who were hoping Halle would maybe share a bit more about how she's cured diabetes . Thank Heavens, when somebody drops the syringe-baton, somebody else picks it up. Enter Jenna Phillips and her website Mission Possible . Here's what you need to know: Jenna is Ben Stiller's personal trainer (when he's in LA). Jenna went from 50 units of insulin per day to 5. Her mission: The reality of being diabetic forever was also not an option for me. From that point on I have been on a mission to become insulin free. Come on, Halle - Jenna's going after your legacy. I smell a reality show in the works. Let's lock them in in a room with one bottle of Humalog and see who cracks first.

Of late, I've been thinking about trying a pair of Brooks Glycerines. Why, I don't know? I love my Asics Nimbus 10's - heck, I'm already on my second pair, but I've been mulling it/considering it/thinking about it, which seems irresponsible. Why leave a perfectly good pair of shoes? And now this: Brooks is giving me (and you!) 90 days to try out some of their shoes . 90 days, no questions asked. (Never mind the fact that at current mileages I only get 60 days out of shoes...) Hmmm.... now would be a good time for Asics to send me a shirt or something to remind me that they're happy I'm a customer. While I can't be bought, I can definitely be rented, particulary for 90 days.