From df622a781b02956199e53631fd8bccd039ce1615 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Santiago Britt Date: Mon, 14 Sep 2026 18:28:09 +0000 Subject: [PATCH] Add A Couple of Months with Continuous Glucose Monitoring --- A-Couple-of-Months-with-Continuous-Glucose-Monitoring.md | 7 +++++++ 1 file changed, 7 insertions(+) create mode 100644 A-Couple-of-Months-with-Continuous-Glucose-Monitoring.md diff --git a/A-Couple-of-Months-with-Continuous-Glucose-Monitoring.md b/A-Couple-of-Months-with-Continuous-Glucose-Monitoring.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..905f7ee --- /dev/null +++ b/A-Couple-of-Months-with-Continuous-Glucose-Monitoring.md @@ -0,0 +1,7 @@ +
This is the story of how I went from a serious amateur athlete with almost pre-diabetic glucose levels to a lighter healthier version of myself. We all know that eating too much carbs and sugar is not good for you. However, most endurance athletes, including me, seem to ignore this advice, consuming large amounts of carbs to fuel their training. Still, most of us know that cutting carbs is a good way of shedding a few pounds, but it’s unclear how we go about it. Can I eat carbs during my ride? Just before? Just after? I had a similar situation with sleep a few years back. I became completely overtrained and was cut from the team. It was not until I started monitoring my HRV, sleep quality and mood with Wattson Blue that I learnt what it takes to improve and [maximise](http://dig.ccmixter.org/search?searchp=maximise) my performance. Such monitoring meant I have kept improving and breaking PBs in the last couple of years (until lock down started around March 2020), adding around 40 watts to my FTP, while substantially reducing my training volume and not doing much "structured" training (other than the simple tips Wattson Blue gave me).
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I simply had fun and listened to what my body was telling me. My fitness peaked at around 4.2 w/kg FTP in the famous power-to-weight ratio, and wanting to reduce my training volume I decided to see what I can do about the weight side of the equation. Reading and thinking more about the subject, I started to believe that similar to the sleep issue, my excess weight has been primarily due to lack of monitoring. To improve my performance I had to monitor an internal measure (i.e. HRV and mood) rather than an external measure (i.e. sleep length). That’s where CGM devices come in. I had known about CGMs, which monitor your blood glucose (or sugar) levels, for a while. When I saw an advert for Supersapiens in January 2021, I decided to finally take the plunge and start monitoring my [GlycoMode Blood Sugar support](https://87722.cn/thread-23350-1-1.html) glucose levels to see what exactly I was doing to myself with all the snacking and crisp eating.
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Before the CGM, I ate what I would consider a reasonably healthy diet, excluding short bouts of binge eating crisps and chocolates. You probably all know what that looks like, porridge, and peanut butter, avocados, eggs, sweet potatoes, lots of greens, pan fried or roasted fish, other meats, and lots of fruits. Pfff, You call that healthy? Well yes, I do, or I did - I am sure plenty of articles would disagree with that statement, but I can find plenty of articles that say it was a good diet. So for the purposes of this article, just accept that I thought what I was eating was healthy. So what is CGM? I am not going to give you the full details, but in simple terms, the device measures your glucose levels, continuously. It doesn’t quite do it in the same way as a blood test, but it’s close enough and gives you similar feedback without needing to be pricked with a needle several times a day.
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The particular Supersapien model is always "on" and connected to your phone via Bluetooth meaning you get almost minute by minute measurements. High blood glucose levels can lead to weight gain. Unless you are exercising at the time all that glucose can end up being converted and stored as fat. It also means your body will not attempt to burn your existing energy stores so losing weight becomes more difficult. In the long term, it can also lead to chronic high levels of insulin, insulin resistance and diabetes. Moreover, there is research that suggests high blood glucose levels can lead to mental health issues and dementia. I may have butchered how a professional would describe blood glucose and insulin resistance, but this is my understanding in a whistle stop tour! The argument is that many endurance athletes suffer from this unhealthiness because of their high sugar and carbohydrate consumption. So even if you exercise enough to burn a lot of those calories, having high blood sugar levels most of the time generally leads to long-term health issues.
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