Wearing a pump during heavy weight training and high intensity cardio?

I was going to put this as a discussion in my group, but I thought this was a better general discussion. So what’s the standard protocol for wearing a pump during exercise? I do cardio two-three times/week, usually high intensity interval training on a treadmill once or twice and one long run. My main thing is weight lifting, heavy weight lifting. It worries me about knocking the pump off with a weight belt during deadlifts and setting 400+ lbs down on it or having the belt tighten up on the tubing and kink it or rip it out of my side. I have problems with my headphones getting pulled from my ears with a belt on and that’s why I worry about the tubing or the infusion site getting really jammed into my side. How tough are the clips that come with the pump and can they handle plyometric exercises (box jumps, stairs, power cleans, power snatch, ect…). Is it kosher to take it off for awhile during the heavy high intensity lifts and then stick it back on for the auxiliary lifts? I have to hammer gatorade during my lifts as is to keep my BG up and not end up in the 30-40 range by the end, so I don’t think 15 min w/o a pump will kill me, but I have no idea since I have yet to even wear it!



I’ve worn my ipod for years working out and never really have problems with getting it knocked off, but that’s only a $200 piece of electronics, not a $12G life supporting gift from my insurance company. I also umpire baseball at the collegiate level and if taking a 90+ mph fastball to my hand will cause me to have to have a thumb reconstruction it will def destroy a pump. Umpiring brings up a whole other set of problems. Outside during the summer in 90+ degree heat with 30 lbs on gear, in dark pants and a black shirt. It was fun last summer, but this summer w/o a honeymoon I’m guessing that I’m really going to have to kill my basal. I know they make billet aluminum neoprene padded cases for cell phones (I have one), do they make them for pumps? If not I might have to have one made. BTW I’m getting the Animas Ping pump.



SuFu

Have you tried a neckstrap case?
Iv used this occasionally… still have to adjust it a bit so it doesnt hang too low…

I certainly don’t lift near the weight you do but I have found weight training with a pump interesting. Typically I just move the pump around out of the way of my barbells/dumbbells depending on whatever move I’m doing. I don’t disconnect for exercise. I find that lower intensity or aerobic exercise I need to reduce my basal rate. For higher intensity or anaerobic I need to increase my insulin. The pumps are pretty durable they’re not fragile so I don’t worry about it from that aspect at least as far as basic stuff goes. The clips eventually break down but my pump stays where I put it.

You can always disconnect if you’re more comfortable with that or if the activity and/or blood sugar response warrants. I would make sure you secure the pump somewhere safe though not loose in the gym or in a gym bag but in a locked locker. It would be too easy to lose or someone might steal it thinking it was a fancy new phone or pager. Part of your pump training should include how to replace insulin if you’re off your pump for a certain period of time. How that is handled depends on how long you’re unhooked a couple of hours vs a whole day sort of thing. The few times I’ve had to disconnect for workouts I just kept it off for the whole time period though rather than hook on and off.

It’s also something you’ll figure out as you go along. Happy pumping.

I use an Amphipod belt for running. I clip my pump to it but it also has a number of different, sort of modular pockets and I’ve currently got 3x pockets (jelly beans, iPod/ $$/ key) and phone (4G HTC Evo, a fairly heft hunk of phone…) + 3x bottle clips, 2 for drinks (water/ gatorade in various combinations depending on what my BG is up to) and my One Touch Ultra Mini Clips into the other one. I just clip the pump to the belt. I’ve busted a few of the clips. In my experience, the MM pumps are pretty durable. I’ve had a couple of bike wrecks and fell on it a few times in martial arts classes. Nobody kicked it though. I’d agree a fastball is probably a bad idea. I think behind you is the best spot for that. If your doing bench presses or something, the belt pockets also slide around pretty easily if you don’t have so much junk on them. It’s extremely secure. Some of the pocket things have little loops that are kind of like stanchions for headphone cables and pump tubes that would probably help with that?

For weights, you could just run the tube, perhaps behind your weight belt, to a pocket on the back of your Amphipod belt. If you need it in front for particular exercises, you could probably just get a second pocket to go back and forth easily?

I’ve clipped mine to my medic alert necklace for some longer winter bike rides and, inside a shirt, probably a compression one, it would be pretty secure? I’m not sure I’d like it for lifting quite as much as getting it out of the way with a belt. I don’t notice stuff in there at all.

Is it kosher to take it off for awhile during the heavy high intensity lifts and then stick it back on for the auxiliary lifts? I have to hammer gatorade during my lifts as is to keep my BG up and not end up in the 30-40 range by the end, so I don’t think 15 min w/o a pump will kill me, but I have no idea since I have yet to even wear it!



I don’t wear a pump, but I suspect you have your answer right there. You should go untethered. I don’t go low during major lifts, I go high. I also don’t spend hours in the gym, I only spend 30-45 minutes on my core routine, all the rest is accessory stuff. I also think you are going to have to avoid insertion sets anywhere near where your belt will rest. If used properly, the belt will be under significant pressure during the lift and if it shears at all against an insertion, the insertion set is a goner. I only use a belt with squats and deadlifts and even there I only use them for the highest weights. But I am seriously clumsy and the most common injury I have is when I drop something on myself. When that something is heavy it really bites.

I use the MM waist belt for my MM pump, for running and weights (though I don’t think I lift 400 lbs if you combine all of the exercises I do lol). If animas doesn’t have a similar type of item then a spi-belt or other type of running belt would probably work out.