Since I became a proper running nerd, I have been very conscious of the effects of blood donation. For two weeks afterwards, I just can’t get up hills. I still go, though; blood donations save lives and running up hills tends not to.
This February I had a Monday morning session booked. I came in, did the questionnaire and all that, and soon was called into the booth where they check your iron levels. They start with a finger prick. When the lady measured my iron level she said it was a bit low. There were two things they could do now: one was to send me home, and the other one was to take some blood from my arm to do a more precise measurement. Maybe I was still above the threshold!
I won't lie; part of me hoped I would just be below it. Then I could keep all my blood. And that would definitely yield a better result in the upcoming race! But as I said; blood donations save lives. Running races does not. So they took blood from my arm, and lo and behold, I was just above the threshold. They could take a donation.
In a way, that was quite a bad outcome. If they are going to take blood anyway, it's better if your initial iron levels are very high. I figured I would be extra lethargic after losing half a litre from such a weak starting point. But let's have it!
When they stuck the needle into my arm, the blood wasn't flowing as it normally is. I tend to be done in five minutes. This time they struggled to get a full donation out of me in 15 minutes. But they just made it.
The next day was track training. I told the people in my group I was going to be a bit slower than the previous week, for reasons of the blood donation. The week before I had gone for 4:20 per km; now I would aim for 4:25. For people who don't do track running; this seems so trivial, but believe me: there is a noticeable difference. People were okay with that. Many of them! When I started pacing on the track I tended to have four or five people behind me. This time I had line behind me that was at least 100 m long. Crazy!
The track session actually went perfectly fine. That was nice. But of course there are no hills on the track. The proof of the pudding would be the Thursday Night Hill session.
When I have donated blood I make sure to not run first part of the route, which is in a way a warming up, on the flat. I headed straight for the hill. This is an accepted practice; that first leg is never done by everybody. And when I got to the top of the first hill, I started making my way down before the main group did. And then from the second hill, I just did what everybody else did. And it went fine! Strava said afterwards that I had even done two of the sections unusually fast. These were not the big hills, though. But it was a good sign nonetheless!
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| At the top of the first hill |
I don't know how this all works. How can I be so unaffected by a blood donation if my initial iron levels were so rubbish? I have no idea! But I'm not complaining. I might not even do too badly in the upcoming race, less than a week after donation!
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