Health & Injuries Olympic Games, it’s easy to think that nothing else matters.
For elite athletes, it’s a distant speck on the horizon they spend four years charging toward, but that approach can often leave out an important question—what if they never get there?
In that situation, they can feel like passengers at the end of the line, hopping off a train and looking around with a sense of confusion and dread—lost.
The best way out of it is often to pick another target and move toward it with all you’ve got. For Dathan Ritzenhein, a three-time Olympian whose bid for a fourth Games was derailed by injury earlier this year, Sunday’s New York City Marathon is that target.
The 33-year-old Michigan native has run nine marathons in his life, one of his best performances a second-place finish in New York in 2007 at the Olympic Trials, held in Central Park the day before the New York City Marathon that year. Now, nine years on, he wants to get on the podium in the five-borough race.
“My fitness is as good as ever and mentally I’m ready for that,” Ritzenhein said. “I always fear the marathon though and I think that is important, so I go in nervous but excited.”
Like all those who have raced 26.2 miles, Ritzenhein knows how the distance can chew you up and spit you out, regardless of how diligently you prepare.
in 2012, where he ran his personal best of 2:07:47 to finish ninth I was still fighting some nagging injuries and my heart was not in running track, he said in Los Angeles after 20 miles with his legs cramping and his neck throbbing. The physical pain was no match for the thoughts in his head. “It was pretty devastating,” he said.
Having competed at the 2004, 2008, and 2012 Games, many thought Ritzenhein would qualify for Rio 2016, but there he was, a dropout, for just the second time in more than 20 years of racing.
He struggled with injury on the build-up, and the day before the race he was plagued by a piercing pain in his neck, which forced him to do his entire pre-race jog with his head bowed.
“The pain was so bad,” he said. “I had a lot of work on it and it was 85 percent better for the race, but it still hurt every stride. Everything is multiplied in the marathon.”
In the weeks that followed, he trained his sights on making the Olympic team in the 10,000 meters, but he soon had to accept it was a lost cause.
“I was still fighting some nagging injuries and my heart was not in running track,” he said.
It forced him into an unusual scenario, one he hadn’t experienced for 16 years: watching the Olympics at home.
In Rockford, Michigan, he looked on with gritted teeth, unable to shake the frustration but also harnessing it to feed his resolve. “I just had to finally let it go that I would not be there and it was what finally brought me out of the funk,” he said. “It was like a weight lifted off my shoulders.”
As the sun finally set over Rio, he laced up his shoes with a new goal in mind: New York in November. Pretty soon, that was all that mattered.
Over the last few months, Ritzenhein crept his training up to the same levels he did before the Chicago Marathon in 2012, where he ran his personal best of 2:07:47 to finish ninth.
He averaged 100 miles a week, crammed into six days of running and one day off. Two days a week he completed drills and strides, aimed at improving his mechanics and preserving his speed. In the summer he also cross-trained for a few hours each week, but that was shed from his program as attention turned to marathon-specific work.
As always, the battle to bulletproof his body from injury was never-ending; five times a week he had some form of physical therapy; three days a week he lifted weights in the gym; another few hours were spent on those mind-numbing strength exercises that distance runners love to hate.
Since 2014, Ritzenhein has been self-coached, having left Alberto Salazar and the Oregon Project in order to return home to Michigan.
“I run my training past some people but I have really tried to do what is the best for my body now,” he said. “I train based on how I feel. It just takes discipline and I have to be honest with myself, which is the hardest part sometimes.”
Developing that wisdom has helped him stay at the top of his sport as so many of his contemporaries moved into retirement. Ritzenhein graduated high school in 2000, the same year as Alan Webb and Ryan Hall, Major Changes Hit Northern Arizona Elite.
Webb went on to become the American record holder at the mile, but retired two years ago at the age of 31, while Hall, the fastest American-born marathoner in history, retired this year at 33.
Was Ritzenhein ever tempted to follow their lead?
“I thought about it for sure,” he said. “I see those guys and others retire and I think about it, but I’m still running great and I enjoy it. Eventually the body or the mind gives out, but that varies from person to person. As long as the fire is still there I’ll keep going. I love to train most days, and I’m still one of the best runners in the world.”
Was Ritzenhein ever tempted to follow their lead Mo Farah—widely regarded as the world’s best distance runner—all the way in the Great North Run in Newcastle, England. Ritzenhein’s time of 1:00:12 for the half marathon, which brought him home eight seconds behind Farah, We may earn commission from links on this page, but we only recommend products we back.
“That helped me believe I can contend for the podium and title in New York,” he said.
Ritzenhein is one of just five runners in the men’s field on Sunday to have run below 2:08, so a podium finish is realistic. Though he believes the Tokyo Olympics in 2020 are still on the agenda, it’s major marathons like this that will fuel his fire for the next few years.
“It has always been my dream to win Boston, New York, and Chicago,” he said. “New York is special because it’s the biggest stage and the atmosphere is just so exciting.”
Asked what he likes most about the race, his answer is typical of a man whose career has been defined by an ability to suffer, one who believes he can make 2016 memorable for all the right reasons.
“I love the course; it’s just so brutal,” he said. “It is usually a death march the last 10K but you can run well if you just hold it together. I took a couple of ugly beatings there the first two times, but hopefully the third time’s the charm.”
Cathal Dennehy is a freelance writer based in Dublin, Ireland, who covers the sport for multiple outlets from Irish newspapers to international track websites. As an athlete, he was Irish junior cross-country champion and twice raced the European Cross Country, but since injury forced his retirement his best athletic feat has been the Irish beer mile record. He’s happiest when he’s running or writing stories about world-class athletes.
