Vale of Belvoir 200km Audax

Time for a second ride of the Lichfield Audax. After the last few weeks of very hilly rides I was pleased I had this in the calendar. I had thought Paul might join me for his first 200km rides but after TINAT he was taking a break from audaxing.

This was my first long ride using the miao miao transmitter, changing my libre, flash glucose monitoring device into true continuous glucose monitor (cgm). It was great to be able to keep riding whilst keeping an eye on my watch to check my glucose. No more stopping to scan the libre sensor or juggling the libre reader in one hand, steering the bike with the other and scanning the sensor whilst riding along.

My glucose has high for the first 50km and I had to stop several times to do corrections. I was careful to just correct by a couple of units each  time to avoid hypoing. I was in range and dropping by the time I arrived at the first control, perfect preparation for cake consumption. I ordered a cream tea and sat out in the court yard. Seeing a fellow audax rider tucking into a slice of raspberry frangipane, I ordered one of these as well. Remembering the recent advice from my dietitian to 'eat 2 cakes instead of 1' when stopping during a long cycle ride. The route was slightly different to last year, avoiding the traffic lights through Melton Mowbray. I also opted for the alternative control at the half way point, diverting to the co-op in Colsterworth for a danish pastry and bag of crisps, far better than the A1 services. I judged the 2 units of novorapid for 50g carbs perfectly and spiked up to 8 before dropping back down to 5.5 within a couple of hours. At 150km I stopped at Sutalia cafe in Loughborough. Last year I just had some cake here but this time I treated myself to a bowl of pasta with roast vegetables and tomato sauce. It was delicious and worth the slightly extended cafe stop. During the final 15km my watch started giving low glucose alerts. I had a couple of glucose tablets and continued. My glucose remained stubbornly less than 3.5 and Paul phoned to check I was okay. I scanned my glucose sensor with the libre reader and got a reading of 4.7 so I judged this was an xDrip calibration error and carried on riding. The following day I confirmed my suspicions with a blood test. The xDrip calibration was slightly wrong giving falsely low results. It was a reminder that xDrip should only be calibrated when glucose concentrations are very stable.

Overall glucose control was pretty good during the ride. My dosing for he first and second food stops was very good. I need to reduce novorapid dose further towards the end of the ride. Glucose concentration was high overnight after ride as I didn't inject enough insulin with post ride meal.