Alas, I turned in my NYC Marathon timing chip yesterday. I had hoped that some miracle would have happened and my hacking cough would have gone away. But no such luck.
I am very disappointed to be brought down by a sickness. 4 months of training, seeing great track times and growing strength on hill repeats – it was tough to realize that my body would not hold up to 4 hours of max performance in cold weather racing (it’s been in the 40s everyday I’ve been here in NYC; the last 3 years I ran NYC it was in the 70s!).
Rather than risk this developing into something REALLY bad like pneumonia, I elected to not race. It’s a first for me: to not race due to sickness and it was bound to happen sometime.
At least I was able to defer my entry until next year. Not sure if I will race it though; I’ve got my sights on either Ironman Florida or Ironman Western Australia and that may mean that NYC isn’t possible. NYC is usually on the same weekend as IM Florida, as it was this year. IM Western Australia is usually on Thanksgiving weekend or the first weekend of December, which means NYC is very close to the race.
Onwards to off season training. I want to work on strength in my legs this winter, in preparation for a strong race season next year.