During the two week “no caffeine” period, my brother Daniel and I both found that we missed not the stimulant but just coffee itself–the ritual, the warm beverage in the morning. We both began drinking decaf as a result, but I’ll tell you a secret–decaf just doesn’t taste as good as regular. Or at least, I’ve yet to encounter a brand of decaf that could hold a candle to my beloved Trung Nguyen.
I am still caffeine-free though (as far as I know. Like, I ate a cookie called a “mocha cookie” the other day, but it didn’t really taste like coffee and I didn’t feel caffeinated afterward). I actually feel pretty good, and mostly not sleepy in the afternoons like I used to get when I was drinking a lot of caffeine. I don’t know how long I will stay decaffeinated, though.
I have a lot of heart rate data for myself, since I usually wear a heart rate monitor when I run. It would be interesting to do some analysis on it and see if my average HR (while running) has changed now that I am off caffeine. I think it might have…but there are too many other factors to really say for sure. Oh well.
We’ll file this under RC567.5 .L86 2012 for Internal medicine—Neurosciences. Biological psychiatry. Neuropsychiatry—Psychiatry—Psychiatric aspects of personality and behavior conditions—Drug abuse. Substance abuse—Caffeine.
Yesterday I participated in the 21st Annual Literacy Network Run/Walk. Formerly known as the Canterbury Run/Walk after a much-beloved, now defunct bookstore, this was actually the first 5k I ever ran way back when I started running (I finished last that time). I wasn’t really going to write anything about this, but then I won 4th overall among women (results). I finished the 10k in 50:54, which is about an 8:12 pace. It didn’t feel like I was near my VO2 max or anything, but my legs were tired, so that’s as fast as I ran. I guess I shouldn’t have knocked out 12 miles on the dreadmill the day before?
The field was very small this year (101 finishers) because it was absolutely pissing down rain the entire time. Around mile 3, the rain slowed briefly, but then it picked up again. There was not a dry inch on me anywhere when I got done, and I still had to run two miles back to my car.
So for your amusement, here are before and after photos.
I want to add two final thoughts to my race report from the Milwaukee Marathon. One is that both of the photos in the post were taken by MM people/their hired photographers and “borrowed” by me. The other is that twice on the course I heard the song “Gangnam Style” by Psy. I’ve also heard it on the radio recently–the mainstream, commercial, top 40 radio. I am really excited that an Asian pop song would make its way over here…but if South Korea is going to be the part of Asia that finally explodes into mainstream American consciousness, I have totally backed the wrong horse (China, Viet Nam, เมืองไทย).