World-class snowboarder Chris Southwell is always on the hunt for steep glaciers and ideal snow conditions. During the next couple of weeks, the 27-year-old Englishman is taking off to another adventurous trip, accompanied by a film crew from the Sky Sport television network. By helicopter he will also advance to virtually unexplored mountain terrain. His type 1 diabetes is not keeping him from facing new challenges. For a number of years now, his pancreas has no longer produced the vital hormone insulin. The upcoming tour is the final stop in the television series “Mountain Lives”, which portrays the everyday lives of Chris Southwell and four other professional athletes. And for Chris, it represents a worthy finale to a good year of competition.

“The diabetes diagnosis was initially a shock for me,” admits Chris. “But it never kept me from competing in my sport.” Today, in his seventh season as a professional athlete, he is among the world’s best snowboarders. In the World Freeride Tour, he finished among the top 10 athletes in a total of four races this winter, with a fifth place finish in Lenzerheide, Switzerland, at the end of March. Furthermore, he laid an important foundation for the coming season. The final race was also the beginning of the Freeride World Qualifying Event 2011. Chris’s performance was especially impressive in light of the fact that he seemed to have been cursed with a streak of bad luck of late. In mid-February, a painful shoulder injury forced him to take a six-week break. He celebrated his comeback at the Big Snow Festival in Andorra in front of some 1,000 spectators. “My jump was perfect, and the atmosphere among the spectators and competitors was unbelievable,” recalls Chris.

To be successful in his sport, he must be constantly well prepared. The professional athlete – who has a passion for extreme freeride snowboarding and loves to jump down gradients up to 30 metres high – pays careful attention to when he eats his meals and the amount of carbohydrates he consumes. He also measures his blood glucose regularly, checking his levels as often as nine times a day. His BREEZE® 2 blood glucose monitoring system from Bayer includes a sensor disc that enables him to make up to ten consecutive measurements without having to change the test strip disc. This simplifies life with diabetes, particularly during competitions and on the slopes. He also feels well equipped for further adventures. Currently, Southwell is planning a trip to Spitsbergen, Norway, in May. A true challenge is waiting for him in the icy region north of the Arctic Circle: “There are a lot of polar bears in that area” Southwell says. “I may well have to rely on my snow¬board to move faster than the great white giants.”