Man, recovery time has nothing to do with how good an athlete you are. It all depends on the severity of the injury. How many times has ole Evel been banged up throughout his career? And I was always in tip top shape. You can't control recovery time. The only thing you can do is make the time go by smoother with a little Wild Turkey and a couple of hotties. Hang in there buddy.
Think of it two ways:
1) better athletes will not suffer as much as you in terms of lactate production from intense training, so they will not get into as much "trouble" as you at equivalent paces
2) better athletes will have an aerobic system that aggressively mops up any lactate efflux from working muscles, meaning if they Do get into "trouble" they will recover from it faster than you thru better clearance ability
If you cannot recover like them, you will not be able to compete with them in a middle or long distance race