Should You Feel Guilty Taking A Rest Week?

Most of you that know me, know that I have never won a race. You also know that even if I come close it's because the rest of the field had a real bad day. My training in the month of August both time and effort, have been more than I have put into any sports endeavor ever. Everything I read says you have to follow a strong cycle of training with some rest time to avoid "over training". My question is, if you never come close to the winning end of a race, can you ever claim that you are over trained? So with 20 or so days before the c/x season opener, I'm taking a short rest period before the last big push to be a CAT 4 somebody. So if there is no improvement in my race results, at least I'll sleep better knowing I'm not over trained! Ty