Photo via IDS

You may have heard about the new study just published in the Journal of Sexual Medicine that suggests the "best sex" should last between 7 to 13 minutes*, as reported in places like this and this and this.

But here's the problem with those reports: the study was not done on sex but on intercourse. Those are two very different things: "Sex" encompasses all sexual techniques employed in an effort to deliver and gain physical pleasure and perhaps orgasm; "Intercourse" is simply--and only--penetration of a vagina with a penis, with the expectation of a male ejaculatory culmination. That's a BFD...

*(Though in most cases 3 or more minutes would do and in some cases more than 10 minutes might be too long.)

The study surveyed sex therapists to try to determine a norm for the time from initial penetration to ejaculation, in order to allay unrealistic expectations and prevent resulting distress about individuals' pelvic penetration performances. But is it really any shock that nobody--male or female--would want pumping time to last longer than 13 minutes (well, nobody except maybe Sting and Trudie Styler)? Hello, rug burn!

Okay, okay, we know there are probably some of you out there who do enjoy 13+ minutes of thrusting, but we're speaking in generalities. And you'll notice in the study's abstract that female orgasm ain't mentioned anywhere. That's because traditional in-out jackhammering doesn't do it for the majority of ladies, especially if one or both partners don't understand or communicate the complexity of the female anatomy, i.e. that clitoral stimulation may be necessary for her orgasm, that shallow penetration may be preferable to deep pelvic thrusts for her, that mental as well as physical stimulation may be required before penetration begins for her optimal enjoyment, or that a dick (either the appendage or the person) may not be able to provide the kind of stimulation she needs to climax...

Understand that this study was only about optimal penile penetration time for his orgasm, and not about how to have good sex (which may or may not include intercourse) or how long it should take for her to climax from whatever kind of stimulation (which also may or may not include intercourse). The sooner we can all agree that sex is not simply intercourse, the better off we'll all be in bed.