A funny thing happened on the way to recovery

Somewhere in Mile 24 of last week's Clarence DeMar Marathon, I had made my mind up. Never again would I put my body through this torture. My racing days are officially over, I told myself.

After finishing, I told my mom that, too. And anyone else who would listen.

The day after the race I was sore as expected, having thoroughly exhausted my energy and depleted my muscles of everything they had. The fact that the result of that effort (3:24:21) was less than desirable made the mental fatigue as great as the physical.

Even my two worst marathons did not have this effect. After the 3:54:10 of the Fortitude for First Descents Marathon in 2012, I refused to rest and instead jumped right back into training to run the Central Park Marathon two months later (at which I nailed a 3:06:28, my third best). After last year's Park City Marathon (3:51:31), I vowed to get moving again and placed third overall with a 3:18:31 at the Fort Myers Beach Marathon three months later.

Though last week's race beat those by a half-hour, I could not help but feel like it was over. I have experienced "the wall" too many times now and could not bear to go through it again. Oh, I will still run marathons for fun, I said to myself, but my racing days are over.

Tuesday, I felt no better, but I started thinking about a proposition by a friend of mine who offered to sell me his NYC Marathon bib for a hundred bucks.

Yes, I know it is unethical to run with the bib of someone else.  But perhaps, I reasoned, if I do New York City without the pressure of having to perform up to my usual expectations, I can restore the joy of marathon running that got lost last weekend.

I looked up Hal Higdon's Multiple Marathon training guide and got back outside on Wednesday and Thursday for some slow short runs. Saturday I did an equally slow six-miler, but with more strength, more confidence.

Sunday's 14-mile easy run included my first sub-8 mile since the middle of last week's marathon. The rest of this week's runs were all at sub-8 pace. Suddenly, I started thinking that not only was a marathon in four weeks possible, but a decent time goal was possible, too.

Within a week, my whole attitude changed from "never again" to "I can do it again in four weeks". I will see how the rest of this week pans out, then make my decision. If things continue to look up, then I will see you in New York City.  

But you will not know it is me because I shall not divulge the name of the person whose bib I will use.