Sex shop and pulse training

This post will have many pictures. Just kidding.

So last week was not a good week. I know, I know: every week is what you make of it. But I was working A LOT, couldn't run AT ALL and I felt my PhD project was getting the shaft in many ways for no apparent reason. And this created even more work.

I started eyeing something in the window of the local sex shop. I am allowed to admit things like this, right? Olga might say it's because I'm almost European.

But I was terrified of someone seeing me walk in. It is one thing to buy slinky lingerie at Victoria's Secret or any other acceptable underwear retailer. It's another to walk into a genuine sex store. What if one of my patients saw me? Or my colleagues? What would they think? What would you think if you saw your doctor walking into one of these stores?

Anyway, on Friday they had 50% off everything in the store. So I made sure the street was COMPLETELY clear of people and darted in. I successfully found what I wanted. And all was going well and I was about to make a purchase when I noticed a large selection of batteries on the wall. "Huh" I thought. "This is just like a regular old corner store. Why on earth would they have such a variety of batteries?" Out of the corner of my left eye, I saw a large, purple, glowing... "ah yes, that is why they have batteries." I am still an American at heart.

I rushed out of the store and down the street, hoping the bag would not give me away.

So, yeah, I just didn't really feel like running after the Brocken Marathon. The entire left side of my body hurt when I ran. Even my heal and shoulder. I started to think running injuries were contagious over the internet from Steve Q and May-Britt, respectively.

But I spent my time pulse training with the other members of my athletic club, Scala. (I swam, too, but that's not important right now.) When you spin, you have a pulse monitor on. And everyone's pulse is displayed on a screen in front of the class. When you do the step/stomach, butt, thighs class, it's also about getting your pulse up. I've realized I get a really good workout from these sessions -mostly because it's competitive. Though I have trouble understanding why it looks like I'm working so much harder than the people next to me, and I certainly am sweating even more than the men, and yet my stupid pulse never gets up to 85% of max, unlike everyone else's. I think I missed something in my physiology class in medical school - or I am actually 20 years older than I thought. Any ideas?

I was fooled by my own blog and thought the Copenhagen 6 hour race was this coming weekend. So I was in the middle of a mega-taper when I realized yesterday, the race is actually October 30th (I know May-Britt, you warned me - I should correct in on my blog!).

Anyway, I hadn't run more than a total of 6 miles in 9 days. SR and I went out for a little speed work today. I was worried about my heal. We ran my favorite semi-hilly trail though farm fields, which I train on often. I never run super fast times there, because of the nature of the trail, so I hesitate to write my times on my blog. But today was different.

We did a 5k x 2.

SR gave me a 3 minute head start. Since his 5k PR is 15:57 and mine is (in truth) 19:46 (don't be confused by the questionable relay time I have listed), I knew he would pass me no problem.

Anyway, he didn't pass me! At least not during the first 5k. I ran the first 5k in 22:10 and the second in 23:19. I know it doesn't sound that great, but it is a training record for me on such a hard trail. If I were simply interested in being fast, I would have been pleased. But there was this other good part about it - IT FELT AWESOME.

Now, if you just read the title and scrolled to the last sentence, you probably think I wrote about something slightly different.