Another day

Something strange happened this morning, relating to my bike ride.  I started a little early, getting out the door at 0527.  I was wearing tights and a heavy jacket, since it was back right around freezing.

Since I'd started early, I did the same loop as the day before, except I added a couple miles through Shirlington (including going up the big hill on S 31st St).  I usually do about an hour and a quarter, and I figured that'd add about fifteen minutes (while writing this, I figured out how to determine it.  It ended up adding 3.5 miles, and took 18:18.  So I was pretty close; in fact, I ended up with 92 minutes of moving time, so I was just about dead-on).

According to Strava, however, I actually started the ride at 0540, not roughly 0530.  I can't figure out where that ten minute discrepancy comes from, although my arrival home about fifteen minutes later than planned would seem to support Strava having the correct time, there.

Being a little late ended up being ok, though, since I didn't have to get breakfast.  I got in, got the paper, then went right up to get the kids out of bed and dressed.  We came downstairs and I got them breakfast, then did my morning ablutions.  So it wasn't really a problem.  Yay.

The one annoyance was that, late in the ride, I noticed that the sun was rising.  I didn't know, to the minute, when that was, but I knew that that indicated that I was running late.  So I had to rush the ride a little bit, which resulted in my heart rate getting a bit higher than I wanted several times towards the end of the ride.  But I think that will work out ok, too (it got up to 133, which is only about 7bpm higher than my target max.  And there is some evidence that my target max might be too low).

The point of keeping it down, of course, was that I did decide to make it an easy ride because of the doctor's appointment.

As far as the doctor, it went... up and down.  They took my height and weight, putting me an inch shorter than last time, and at 152#.  The latter is a pound and change more than I'd weighed myself at home, but does include wearing shorts and having my necessities in those shorts.  So basically the same, I think.  The height is a little weird, although I was slouched a little bit (I would not have guessed an inch, though).

Temperature, surprisingly (since I've been feeling sick for several days), was at my normal.  Blood pressure was pretty low (a tiny bit lower than I normally measure, but not ridiculously so), but pulse was way high.  That is, they measured at 110, and my average on the bike ride was only 117.  So something was going wonky, there.

Because that was so high, they wanted to do an EKG, but everything came out just fine on that (including a pulse of only 71).

I also asked for a ketone test, which I got.  The answer (I figured out after I got home, since they gave it to me in mg/dL instead of mM/L) is that I am in ketosis.  That made me happy, except that I had to listen to the doctor tell me to eat more carbs, that I shouldn't be "emitting so many ketones".

She did say that it's not a dangerous number, which I would have known if she'd given me the other units, but that I needed to eat more carbs to have more energy.  I've never had more energy (well, rarely).  So I think she really doesn't know anything about ketosis, other than the diabetes 1-related ketoacidosis (ironically, the nurse who initially took my vitals suffers from type 1 diabetes).  But acidosis requires more than ten times as many ketone bodies as what I had; I can't get there from here.

The somewhat sad thing here is that I did tell her I went on the diet in order to put my body into ketosis.  So she knew that was the goal.  So her telling me to ingest more carbs really doesn't make a lot of sense.

Anyway, the confirmation about having gotten there was pretty cool.  Maybe I'll just start doing weekly checks on that, to verify that I'm continuing.

In any event, hard ride tomorrow (it'll again be right around freezing).  I'm looking forward to it.  I just got my first long-sleeve jersey (ironic, I know, but I got it at 65% off, so it's hard to argue with that).  I might try wearing just that with a heavy base layer.  If it's warm enough, the freedom of movement will certainly feel nice.