How far??

When we headed out for our run yesterday morning, the distance was still up in the air. We had to get in an 18 miler and a 12 miler and there was a race scheduled for the next day. We decided to see how we felt and take it from there. We had run less than 12 hours ago, so the legs were tight. The first loop was good, my legs were sore but I held a good pace. Heading up Elmgrove I thought about backing off and catching my breath but I was excited that Joe had not caught up. Reaching the car in 37 mins, not bad at all for 4.2 miles. The problem was I had at least 2 more loops of that, maybe even 3. Had I pushed it too hard too early? We switched directions for the second loop. Immedicately Joe and Jessica pulled ahead of me. I didn’t care, we had too many miles to care. Heading up North St, I caught up with Joe. He asked how I was and I could only grunt, we were facing almost a mile uphill. There was nothing nice to be said at that point. We reached the car again, I didn’t look at my watch, I could tell it was much slower than the first loop. Jessica left us and we were on our own. I asked Joe if he had 18 in him, he said to focus on the next loop. We took off again. Things were feeling good, no pain and no residual soreness. By now there were more people out, as I passed them with a terrible look on my face I wanted to explain I was on mile 10 with 3-8 more to go. I kept my mouth shut and kept going. I was thinking about what would happen when we reached the car, I would offer to keep going and Joe would choose to stop, it would work seemlessly We reached the car again, at first it looked like we were going to keep going. I offered to keep going and when he was supposed to say no, he said yes! WHAT?!?! I don’t really want to keep going, I’m pooped!! I shut up and refueled, I must have had a look on my face because within minutes he said, you don’t look good, let’s go home and tackle it tomorrow. THANK GOD!! Not that 18 will feel any better tomorrow, but I’ll worry about it then. We packed up and headed home. As I type this, it’s tomorrow and we are facing 18 miles to start in an hour or so. I’m nervous, it’s going to hurt and there is no waiting for tomorrow today.