Helmet Nazi

I am a reformed helmet Nazi. I had a previous life spent mountain-biking on some of the most treacherous singletrack around. It wasn't crazy stuff in the Camloops. I was never a freerider/gravity junkie. But I had many a ride where a wrong turn meant catastrophe. And I wore a helmet every ride - never fail. I made my kids wear helmets to ride in the driveway. I wore one on rides to the grocery store. I wore a chink in my wife's armor and got her to wear one.

I'm here to say the helmet Nazi is gone. My whole mindset is different now that I carry around a deadly disease. I can't even put my finger on the logic, or lack thereof, that makes me skip a helmet some days. I'm not a religious guy, I don't believe in fate. I try to base my life on logic and reason. And it fails when it comes to helmets nowadays.

I know that just as a wrong turn on my mountain bike would have put me 500 feet down a cliff, a wrong turn on my road bike will put me in front of a speeding car. The risk is probably no less on a road bike. But somehow diabetes has turned me into a slight taker of risks. I'm almost 50 years old. I'll probably be dead in about 25 more. And this last 25 had better be damn good years.

I recently read the book "Roadie" - it details the lifestyle of the road-racing cyclist. I'd recommend it to anyone interested in skinny tire bikes. Within it there is extensive information on drafting. This is an important concept in racing wherein the cyclist shields themselves in the slipstream of the rider in front. There is a short passage within the book describing truck surfing. Imagine this - wait on your bicycle for a semi truck to enter a highway and come up to speed. Then you, on your tiny 17 lb. bicycle jump in immediately behind the truck and use the trucks mass to shield yourself from the wind. You need to be just 10 or so feet behind the trailer, spinning like mad so you can stay in the slipstream for a mile or so.

I want to do this. But I'm almost 50 years old now, and physically incapable. It's a shame I'm just now deciding to do some of the things in life I have wanted to do all along - things I kinda' repressed. Now, on Sunday mornings, on the little rural farm roads I ride for training, I'm going to skip the helmet sometimes.

Do you GU?

No diabetes blog is complete without the obligatory entries on diet, cooking and nutrition. So here is my first:

Phil Southerland, team founder of professional cycling team Team Type 1 says he started cycling so he could eat Snickers candy bars. The idea being, if you work your butt off you need some carbs to keep hypoglycemia at bay. I like the concept. I’ve been having a great time eating sports gels their ilk in the last few months. Because I’ve been working my butt off. I’m pretty sure I have a long way to go in refining my whole insulin and carb regime for long training rides. That is the subject of another blog post, and many a dissertation.

What I want to pose here is another question entirely. How much trouble is it to prepare your own sports foods? Like sports gels, etc? I read on the regular diabetes bulletin boards about how you guys use Smarties instead of glucose tabs. I did a little economic analysis, read the label and switched. For me, that was a no-brainer. And the other day I picked up a packet of Sports Beans. And one hour later in Wal Mart I picked up a package of Jelly Bellies – those little gourmet jelly beans. I’ve convinced myself they are enough alike to try the Jelly Bellies. Besides, they sponsor a UCI Continental cycling team – they gotta’ be good folks. (See Cycling News UCI race classifications decoded here.)

But where do you draw the line? Can you make your own gels, and is it a practical undertaking? I googled DIY sports gels and spent 60 minutes on a cooking/nutrition odyssey that blew my mind. On one end of the spectrum was the guy who prepared his own gels using syrups, raw dextrose, trace minerals, green tea extract and no doubt lots of critical care. He recommended a shelf life and packaging techniques. Whew! To quote Jimmy Buffet - I don’t need that much organization in my life! On the other end of the spectrum laid a guy that squared up with my sensibilities – he questioned why you couldn’t just make up some plain old PBJ sandwiches and shove them in your pocket. The flatter they got the better they tasted, so he said.

My conclusion is to continue to be lazy and cheap. On the lazy side I’m going to continue to buy the little sports gel packs for about a buck each. REI will give you 20% off if you buy any 12 food products at once. On the cheap side, I’m not going to spring for a pack of 35 “Sports Beans” that are probably jelly bellies in disguise. And of course - I'll throw in the ol' YMMV, but offer us an opinion - comment on this post and tell us what you do and think.

Free Range Athletes

I drove past a new gym in my home town the other day and said out loud - "Get outside people!". That's my inner Free Range Athlete speaking. The marquee stated they now had SpinnerVision...which would be a horror show for me. I had visions of "Les Triplettes of Belville". A cryptic reference here - to be sure. Follow the link.

Flash back to early January and you will find me slipping into 3 layers of winter cycling clothes and pumping up the tires on my cyclocross bike. I don't own a cyclocross bike so I can race - far from it. I own a 'cross bike so I don't have to go to the gym. Early January saw me watching the degree of ice on my new training routes, trying to sew my own winter-weight tights (emphasis on the word trying), and freezing my nose off while riding the roads. Think adrenaline rush when you hit pure ice, try to keep the bike perfectly straight, and have a gust of wind push you onto the shoulder.

Velo News had a beautiful article on early season training in Italy. There were glorious photos of two riders on a twisty mountain road, warming up in a small cafe, and ending their day on the cobblestones in their little home away from home. No SpinnerVision for these guys - they're my picture of true Free Range Athletes.

After a beautiful weekend, with two training rides totalling 58 miles in the sunshine, I woke this morning to snowflakes spitting from dark skies. It's light enough now to see the hills around me wrapped in clouds and a fresh dusting of white. And I'm grinning like a Free Range Athlete should.

Team Type 1

You have to learn more about Team Type 1 and the people behind it. This is as close to hero worship as I get - I think Lance Armstrong is cool, but Phil Southerland and Joe Eldridge take first prize in the inspiration category. These guys are the founders of Team Type 1, and both have Type 1 diabetes. Both are professional bicycle riders. There are four men and two women Type 1's in their professional ranks. I can't say enough about how tough you have to be to race professionally - really I can't because I am so far from it. Their goal is to have a Type 1 in the Tour de France by 2012.

Read about these people, view their video, get out and exercise and get your blood glucose levels down.

False Start

I began this blog back in January 2009 when I started training for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation "Ride to Cure". I tried for a few days and stopped. I'm back.

Here's a synopsis of things for January and February: Starting training is hard. The weather is cold in Colorado in winter. Rainsing money for JDRF is cool. Now - on with the blog.