Getting back to exercise!

[The_Bowlii]

Hi Chris,

The sensor dropping in and out I've noticed recently - it seems to be unhappy with large rates of change (positive and negative) of BG, which is probably fair enough (but also something that does happen with sports), I also notice that it often comes back with a bit of an offset after one of these episodes, but tends to settle back down eventually (I don't need XDrip+'s calibration much these days, but it's nice to be able to keep an eye on it just in case a sensor goes TU.)

Just translated TU 🙂 !

Sounds like the normal riding is working really well, I'm really pleased for you. It would be interesting to see if you start trending down on really long rides (but perhaps more an experiment for the summer, or indeed to be skipped completely!) I'm assuming you may still have some endogenous insulin production helping you along (and not helping post-ride).

I’m really keen to have a go at Audax and some more bikepacking. My levels generally have been a bit up and down recently so assumed this must be the honeymoon period I hear so much about. A little bit of me is hoping the pancreas has had a rest and will spring back into life but I known that’s not realistic.

The hard turbo session is an interesting one, you'd expect a rise in BG from a hard session (again driven by exercise induced stress hormones causing the liver to up its conversion of stored glycogen to glucose) and then probably a low afterwards. One of those things I guess! 🙂

yes, I’d have expected that normally too but it went with a slight rise for a few mins and then headed down quickly. I assume some residual bolus on board and/or my own pancreas kicking in. It was unexpected as I didn’t check my levels for the 45 minute session so came as a shock to get the alarm!

As an aside I found in the autumn that I didn't need to reduce my basal as much in the morning for long days (I'm half tempted to leave it along completely for anything less than 100 miles, though it will probably all change again once I get out doing those sorts of distances again!)

I don’t touch my basal at all. Still got to do the DAPHNE course so will understand more then. I manage it all through bolus and intensity of exercise. Looking forward to my first 100 miles of the year 🙂 now I know it’s possible.

On the one hand if it's less stress (because I'm fitter and riding at a lower % of FTP (or whatever metric one choses)) that would mean less glucose production by the liver, which ought to mean I'd go lower during the ride rather than what I found which was that I didn't need to eat much. Alternatively, perhaps there's a change in muscle-insulin sensitivity. It could also be a change in how the liver delivers glucose - less but over a longer period (apparently there is some research pointing to this effect for habitual exercise.) More thought (and experimentation) required I think! 🙂

My issue is I want to eat because I feel hungry, can feel performance dropping off but BG still settled at around 7.5 mmol/l. I’m going to try eating on the bike with no bolus and see what happens. A few jelly babies or a protein bar should hopefully be manageable.

P.S. To split a reply (keeping the "Quoting blah" at the top), just press enter somewhere in the quote and it will split into two or as many as you want pieces.

BOOM! Changed my life like Alt Return in an Excel spreadsheet 🙂

 

[SimonP]

Just translated TU 🙂 !

I think it's quite descriptive, but probably not suitable for forum use in full form. I should perhaps choose something else!

I’m really keen to have a go at Audax and some more bikepacking. My levels generally have been a bit up and down recently so assumed this must be the honeymoon period I hear so much about. A little bit of me is hoping the pancreas has had a rest and will spring back into life but I known that’s not realistic.

I should go and do some organised Audaxes too, though I am really just looking forward to some warmer and longer days to go and do more exploring (I think I may be on the cusp of having my own software running on a TwoNav headunit, which will add to the excitement, never knowing whether my navigation will work or not ).

I've never tried bike packing, it's on my list for the coming warmer months - though I think I may be more of a credit card camper 😉 While I bang on about how diabetes isn't limiting, this is one of the few things I do "blame" diabetes for (might be a convenient excuse mind you) - when I was younger you were always supposed to keep insulin refrigerated, and that alongside needing snacks (I always ran low) and regular(ly spaced) food put me off camping, so I never bothered, and here I am now preferring a bed and a bar and a restaurant serving cooked meals when travelling

yes, I’d have expected that normally too but it went with a slight rise for a few mins and then headed down quickly. I assume some residual bolus on board and/or my own pancreas kicking in. It was unexpected as I didn’t check my levels for the 45 minute session so came as a shock to get the alarm!

Is this an RPE effect (Rate of Perceived Effort/Exertion, for those who don't know) - you thought it was hard but your body disagreed and it was actually only Zone 2? 🙂

I don’t touch my basal at all. Still got to do the DAPHNE course so will understand more then. I manage it all through bolus and intensity of exercise. Looking forward to my first 100 miles of the year 🙂 now I know it’s possible.

I doubt DAPHNE will help you with this, the EXTOD conference on exercise was quite good and did iirc mention it briefly, but equally the forum and trial and error are probably just as good (EXTOD was useful to meet people and talk to them about what they do, which is one of the main benefits of conferences in my experience.)

My issue is I want to eat because I feel hungry, can feel performance dropping off but BG still settled at around 7.5 mmol/l. I’m going to try eating on the bike with no bolus and see what happens. A few jelly babies or a protein bar should hopefully be manageable.

I've done some rides like that - judged basal "just right" so I didn't need to eat (so perhaps "too right"), which was fine until >5h in and I was quite tired! (but the legs kept turning)

You may find you can bolus a bit and then eat, there was someone else on this or the other forum who didn't change their basal and took at least some bolus for lunch and apparently was quite happy riding imperial centuries (iirc) that way. We're all different - certainly the last time I tried that (1/3 bolus iirc for lunch at 50miles) I had to stuff my face all the way home, which wasn't fun. But it does of course always change, so I'll start experimenting again as soon as I can find a dry weekend.

BOOM! Changed my life like Alt Return in an Excel spreadsheet 🙂

lol, glad to help 🙂

 

[The_Bowlii]

I think it's quite descriptive, but probably not suitable for forum use in full form. I should perhaps choose something else!

Nah! Works for me.

I should go and do some organised Audaxes too, though I am really just looking forward to some warmer and longer days to go and do more exploring (I think I may be on the cusp of having my own software running on a TwoNav headunit, which will add to the excitement, never knowing whether my navigation will work or not ).

Wow. A proper engineer. For now, I’m looking at options to display BG on my Wahoo head unit. The Supersapiens BG reader and app integrate with Wahoo but not the Libre2. So it’s use my phone, get an Apple Watch or buy a Garmin (dreadful things) and fudge it through a third party app. Unless you know of a different solution?

I've never tried bike packing, it's on my list for the coming warmer months - though I think I may be more of a credit card camper 😉 While I bang on about how diabetes isn't limiting, this is one of the few things I do "blame" diabetes for (might be a convenient excuse mind you) - when I was younger you were always supposed to keep insulin refrigerated, and that alongside needing snacks (I always ran low) and regular(ly spaced) food put me off camping, so I never bothered, and here I am now preferring a bed and a bar and a restaurant serving cooked meals when travelling

I’m a bit nervous too especially having enough instant food when I stop pedalling. Going to try an easy one first and see how I get on. Don’t think +30C temperatures are going to be much of an impediment in the UK right now…

Is this an RPE effect (Rate of Perceived Effort/Exertion, for those who don't know) - you thought it was hard but your body disagreed and it was actually only Zone 2? 🙂

Hah! Strava said not and Zwift agreed! It was actually a virtual ride up Baleach na Bar / Applecross on Zwift. I did it last year in real life fully laden with bike packing gear so it was good to have another go albeit from the comfort of my garage.

I doubt DAPHNE will help you with this, the EXTOD conference on exercise was quite good and did iirc mention it briefly, but equally the forum and trial and error are probably just as good (EXTOD was useful to meet people and talk to them about what they do, which is one of the main benefits of conferences in my experience.)

iirc?

I've done some rides like that - judged basal "just right" so I didn't need to eat (so perhaps "too right"), which was fine until >5h in and I was quite tired! (but the legs kept turning)

Impressive! I did just short of 5 hours on Sunday but that included skittling down the road on my backside thanks to some black ice!

You may find you can bolus a bit and then eat, there was someone else on this or the other forum who didn't change their basal and took at least some bolus for lunch and apparently was quite happy riding imperial centuries (iirc) that way. We're all different - certainly the last time I tried that (1/3 bolus iirc for lunch at 50miles) I had to stuff my face all the way home, which wasn't fun. But it does of course always change, so I'll start experimenting again as soon as I can find a dry weekend.

Tried with and without bolus. Also depends on exertion and type of food. For a flapjack I don’t need to bolus but have had to take a unit following a bacon bap.

lol, glad to help 🙂

 

[SimonP]

Wow. A proper engineer.

Embedded device coding is a just a random sort of thing I fell into while at uni (unrelated to my degree mind you!) - I've always liked gadgets and making them work better for me.

I bought a Garmin headunit and have a watch which all work and display BG data from XDrip+, so it's good enough, but I'd really like more data on the headunit (which I could do by writing my own ConnectIQ datafield) - namely something like a projection of expected BG over the next 5/10/30 minutes based on current BG/delta-BG/IoB/CoB.

To make this work properly I need to enter my carbs (and insulin) in XDrip+ and this is a faff while riding (juggling phone in one hand and trying to pay attention to little buttons), and generally not a good thing at all when it's wet, so I thought a DIY job would a good thing.

I also I want custom map layers (VeloViewer tiles that change colour once I've ridden into them), and some bespoke nav instructions. I want to be able to plan a route, but also add optional side-loops/route changes - I can actually do this with the TwoNav software which came as a surprise, but I want it to also notify me about stuff once I'm out - POIs with distance/time/elevation costs, same for extra tiles, etc. So lots to work on - another one of my never finished projects, but it keeps me out of trouble and I'll soon have something functional to use.

I've got sidetracked!

For now, I’m looking at options to display BG on my Wahoo head unit. The Supersapiens BG reader and app integrate with Wahoo but not the Libre2. So it’s use my phone, get an Apple Watch or buy a Garmin (dreadful things) and fudge it through a third party app. Unless you know of a different solution?

I was going to have a poke around inside the Supersapiens app (decompile it - assuming I can remember how, it's been a while) to see if I could work out how it sends data. I will make a note to do this sometime this week. Do remind me if I forget though!

I’m a bit nervous too especially having enough instant food when I stop pedalling. Going to try an easy one first and see how I get on. Don’t think +30C temperatures are going to be much of an impediment in the UK right now…

This was always my concern, and I think probably more so the overnight pos-exercise low blood glucose stuff. When coupled with potentially being cold (more energy required.) I think I may start with the credit card method and work from there!

Hah! Strava said not and Zwift agreed! It was actually a virtual ride up Baleach na Bar / Applecross on Zwift. I did it last year in real life fully laden with bike packing gear so it was good to have another go albeit from the comfort of my garage.

Weird effect then, no idea I'm afraid!

iirc?

If I Remember Correctly

Impressive! I did just short of 5 hours on Sunday but that included skittling down the road on my backside thanks to some black ice!

Ouch! Hope you and the bike are both ok!

I was actually working back towards normal bolus from my quite severe reductions. Not sure if this was that I was more relaxed about just eating while riding and not worried that I'll go really low, or perhaps I'm just riding at a lower intensity, or perhaps I just got used to it - after my low mileage months in Nov/Dec when I went out for a gentle 70km at the end of December I ran low overnight and for the next ~48h which came as a shock to the system as I didn't get this at all over the summer.

Tried with and without bolus. Also depends on exertion and type of food. For a flapjack I don’t need to bolus but have had to take a unit following a bacon bap.

How high did you go with the bacon bap and were you stopped long? I found that a bacon sarnie was fine as long as I then got going again relatively soon. I must try experimenting with some bolus again, though perhaps I'll have to do 100km's worth of loops around the village so I can bail out home if I start crashing (low BG rather than dizziness 😉)!

 

[SimonP]

I was going to have a poke around inside the Supersapiens app (decompile it - assuming I can remember how, it's been a while) to see if I could work out how it sends data. I will make a note to do this sometime this week. Do remind me if I forget though!

I've just had a look at this, and it's unfortunately more complicated than I'd hoped.

I had hoped that the Supersapiens app was broadcasting an Android Intent (local message to all apps on the phone) or making available some other sort of API for the Wahoo app to use to receive data and pass on to the headunit. This would be fairly easy to simulate after some reverse engineering of the specifics.

What actually happens is more interesting and didn't require pulling the apks apart, though that was also quite interesting (using jadx). It's actually all in the help docs for the two apps:

https://support.wahoofitness.com/hc/en-us/articles/8465036789650-ELEMNT-Supersapiens-CGM-sensor-App-integration

https://supersapiens.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/6296182565783-Wahoo-ELEMNT-Devices

There is a setting in the Wahoo Android app which is enabled to allow the Supersapiens libre2 to be be connected to the Wahoo headunit - I assume changing this setting simply sends a command to the Wahoo headunit firmware so that it is ready to receive some further information to setup the connection.

The connection itself appears to be handled by the Supersapiens app, in which you can pair a device (they do some sort of wrist display gadget) so that it talks to the libre2 sensor directly (there is a similar thing in XDrip+ and Juggluco where you can pass the BLE keys to another device (e.g. a smart watch) to allow it to talk to the sensor - afaiu, I've not looked at it in much detail.)

The Wahoo headunit then appears as a display device in the Supersapiens app (like the wrist display gadget) and after it's been linked the Wahoo simply talks to the libre sensor directly without either app needing to be present (i.e. no phone needed any more).

It would still be possible to reverse engineer the Wahoo "firmware" (they are Android devices too, so the same code above would work once the firmware package format is determined - they are typically quite straightforward in my experience of other platforms) and work out how to do the comms setup handshake, etc.

It would probably be helped by some eavesdropping on the comms between the units while they are being paired (which is doable but not altogether trivial afaiu), though that requires a headunit and a supersapiens subscription, expensive!

I wonder if a normal libre2 sensor would work with the Supersapiens app - I think I've read that it won't though (and you probably also require a paid login to use the app), otherwise it might be worth a go and then kill the Supersapiens app and continue using the sensor with Juggluco.

I have contacted Wahoo in the past to ask them how the comms are done so that I could use a libre2 (well not me, but a T1 colleague wanted to), they completely ignored me.

There is probably more mileage in putting together an app which simulates a BLE CGM device (for which there is a profile), feeding this with data from a libre via e.g. XDrip+ or Juggluco's webservers and then asking the headunit manufacturers to support it as a standard sensor device. I've started the former, though it's not got very far yet!

 

[The_Bowlii]

Hi @SimonP - wow, you know your stuff. Yes, the supersapiens app is a quite expensive subscription model as far as I can tell and it's disappointing it isn't just a matter of linking it to a Libre2 sensor and then the display on the Wahoo head unit. They've got to be the same sensor, I'm sure, but obviously in some way blocked between Libre 2, Supersapiens and Wahoo. I'll let you do the wizardry to sort that!

In the meantime, and quite by chance, I've found that my Garmin watch now broadcasts notifications from the Libre 2 app - unfortunately, it only tells me when I'm going low but at least it's a safety net. I've also looked at getting an Apple watch and linking it via a third party app to my phone / Libre 2 app but can't bring myself to do it just yet - I just check my phone every 30 mins or so for now which seems to work.

Little chance of a ride this weekend - looks sodden! 🙂

 

[SimonP]

Ah, so you get the notification pop-ups from the Libre app on your watch I assume?

I'd suggest moving to Juggluco (and optionally, though I do recommend it XDrip+) - Juggluco is able to do the LibreView uploads which your consultant might want to see, as well as sharing the data locally on your phone (via the same localhost webserver that XDrip+ sets up, so you can use the same ConnectIQ datafield for your watch or the specific watchface.)

I also use XDrip+ for the display and BG prediction curve (so I set Juggluco to shares data with XDrip+ by emulating the "patched/hacked" version of LibreLink, which sends an Intent, and XDrip+ runs its own local webserver). The Garmin Connect app interfaces with this webserver (whichever app provides it) behind the scenes to pass the data across to the watch (or headunit.)

I similarly didn't really want a Garmin (or indeed anything I'd not made myself), however it's useful to have something that works while I tinker. I'm not keen on the maps/navigation, I far prefer to do that with a waterproof phone and a variety of apps, Komoot being one of them, but the routing for that unless you go through each leg is somewhat dubious - I've often found myself 50km into a ride and been presented with a grassy bog to ride across and a 5km backtrack to avoid it. Not the best, but the website is nice to use to plan if you're happy to drag and drop. Off topic again sorry!

Yes, weather hasn't been very kind at all - I only managed 8 rides last month iirc, with two of them indoors! I need to get some miles in as I'm entered in a 100km Sportive in April (Tour de Bristol) with some workmates and plan to ride there and back for a 200km day (lack of miles in the legs meant I failed to make it all the way back from the same thing last year and gave up at 100miles as one of my workmates offered me a lift back from our staging point).

In another slight change of tack, I did go for a run this morning, which was unexpectedly ok - I need something quick to do post-breakfast and pre-work to sort out BG and 0min on the bike isn't as effective as an equivalent run.

I've restarted Couch to 5k, which I first tried last May and gave up after the first run as I had such sore shins (shin splints) that I couldn't ride for the rest of the week. I seem to be fairing better so far this year (fingers crossed), probably because I've done quite a lot of walking recently.