So as a fun experiment, I’ve been testing my ketone (and glucose) levels every morning while in a ‘fasted’ state (aka after I just woke up). A few times I also tested them later in the afternoon before/after a bike ride. I got a free ketone monitor and bought a bunch of strips from Amazon (I haven’t found them in stores).
Three weeks o’ results:
Ketone Levels from 4/8-4/29. Red dots represent days I went on a bike ride.
Two things learned:
1. Biking helps boost ketone levels
2. My period and overeating associated with my period decreases ketone levels
LOL So yes. I did document what I ate almost every day and it was pretty startling how bad it is the week of my period. That huge dip there was EAT ALL THINGS AND HATE THE WORLD.
In a prior post, I documented what it was like to bike/train in ketosis.
Training in ketosis was pretty amazing; I didn’t have to eat and the only thing I felt was some mild muscle fatigue.
Alas, I ate some bbq that had sugar in it (I tried to get the sauceless kind but the marinade was all sugar *cry*) and was out of ketosis for a day. I promptly got back into ketosis but not at the optimal levels in time for the metric century, as per Phinney and Volek.
Regardless, I decided to still do the metric century for the Ride to Recovery (you can see all my bike ride info here on my Garmin site) in a low carb manner.
The amazingly delicious pre-ride breakfast: avocado, bacon and fried eggs!
I brought a baggie of pecans with me and ate a few at two of the stops. I wasn’t hungry, didn’t need them, just felt sort of obligated to munch on something. While climbing on Mulholland, I admit to pausing to… appreciate the view. And maybe just take a breather. Well, about four other riders joined me at the same spot, to… appreciate the view as well. One woman started complaining loudly that she needed Gu/Gel ASAP or she wouldn’t make it.
My days of gagging down this icky slimy sugar are over!
All I could think was ‘none of that sugary stuff for me!’. Each pit stop was your standard carb-loaded table of bananas/cliff bars/etc. Good thing there were no home made PB&Js, I might have caved.
Lots of muscle fatigue, though, which I chalk up to needing more training. This is the longest distance I have biked since having thyroid cancer in late 2011, so I’m really proud of having completed the metric century, and I have a century in two weeks (eek).
Check out the temperature swings that coincided with the elevation climbs! Sea level to the top of Mulholland in the Santa Monica mountains, 30 degrees. Whew!! I use a Garmin 500 to track my rides; I geek out over all the data. 🙂
Ten mile recovery ride the next day started out pretty wretched but once the muscles got warmed up, I felt pretty good. Sadly, I got food poisoning last night so hopefully I’ll be back on the bike by Wednesday.
Nothing new that science hasn’t already posted but it’s still fun to be one’s own science experiment!
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