Hypoglycemia and water meadows

All night, the rain hammered against the windows, but by the time William and I left Gothenburg at 6 am, the sky had cleared, and, with a bit of luck, it will stay sunny throughout our visit to the capital. Now aboard SJ high-speed service 422, William is reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows while I am booking train tickets to Halmstad for the first autumn weeks.

Yesterday, I had a conversation with ChatGPT about what went wrong during Halland Ultra-Beach, and, going through the race step by step, it became clear that the cause of my failure was simply hypoglycemia as I failed to recognise how many hours I had gone without food. In retrospect, it is all slightly embarrassing, as I knew perfectly well how important fuelling is. During the first 40 kilometres of the race, I managed to maintain a steady caloric intake, but as I was dragged down by the many water meadows around Stranninge, I gradually lost track of how much time I was spending out on the course relative to how little I was eating.

In the words of ChatGPT:

This prolonged period of intense exertion without replenishment likely led to severe depletion of glycogen stores and hypoglycemia. Typical symptoms – such as dizziness, coldness, and mental fog – emerged, indicating systemic energy failure. Attempts to ingest a Maurten energy gel at that stage proved unsuccessful due to nausea, which often results from delayed fuelling and gastrointestinal shutdown.

In combination with wet and slippery conditions, the growing sense of disorientation and loss of core temperature signalled a broader physiological collapse. Continuing into the night across exposed coastal rocks in such a state would have posed significant risks. From a safety perspective, the decision to stop was not only reasonable but prudent.