Officially sidelined

Bad news. On this, my second day of rest, the muscle soreness has diminished but the pain in my achilles tendon has not improved and it remains slightly swollen.
This pretty much puts the kibosh on my Spring racing season. Based on what I have read and what's going on, it's looking like I will be out for 4-8 weeks so here's what it means.
Austin- out
Mercedes- doubtful
Atlanta- questionable
Nashville- probable
It's unlikely that I will be even close to PR shape even in Nashville which is 3 months away. I am not in any rush to come back. I will rest as long as necessary to make sure that I am 100% healed. For those of you who did not read my last novel of a post, here's a brief explanation of what went wrong:
I had some significant tightness in my calf due to imbalances and other treatments that did not work and the 13 mile progression run on Sunday simply put too much stress on my Achilles tendon. A 2.5 mile cool down proved to be a very bad call. I blame my unbalanced body chemistry, not my training regimen. I have no real regrets about training for a 3:10 BQ marathon. I had to try. I knew the risks and felt that I was ready. I have failed but at least I know that I gave it an honest effort.
In the future:
Until further notice, I am through with marathons. I will stick with 5Ks, 10Ks, half marathons and any other distance in between. You can finish a marathon on 35-40 MPW which I did in 2008 in Eugene (time was 3:56) but you will not get optimal results unless you train at 60+. That type of mileage is very time consuming and presents a high risk of injury. I can handle the 26.2 mile distance a couple of times a year. As hard as it is to race that distance, it is actually the easy part. 95% of marathon starters make it to the finish line. You are more likely to fail to make it to the starting line just because the training is so grueling especially if you are seeking optimal results. In a half marathon, you can get good results on 45-50 MPW. In fact, I believe that 50 MPW is all that I need to meet my goal of a sub-1:30 half, sub-40 10K and a sub-19 5K so that's where the focus will be in the future. I will not say that I will never run a marathon again. A clean bill of health could change everything that I just wrote. In 2014, I will be 34 years old, which is younger than Geb when he set the world record and the BQ standard will relax to a 3:15, which is 11 seconds per mile slower than a 3:10. Maybe I will be in balance by then.