New trails means no taper

Before I signed up for tomorrow's trail marathon, I committed to spending today hanging out near where my husband is taking a prep class (getting ready for engineering exams).  We are attending a concert tonight and it was the only way we could avoid his leaving the class early to drive home and pick me up for the show.  I realized his class was near one entrance to Chino Hills State Park and jumped at the thought of running most the day...then I succumbed to peer pressure and signed up for a race.

Since I have zero expectations for the race, I decided to go ahead and explore trails today.  I parked at the Discovery Center entrance to the park and picked up a trail map.  I intended on running between 7 and 10 miles and figured I would do an out/back or a loop; I thought one loop would be about 7-10 miles based on a quick glance at the map.  At about mile 3.5, I realized the park is much larger than I realized.  I turned to go up to a peak and started going down a trail to make a loop; two large deer flew across the trail in front of me, initially freaking me out because I did not see that the first was a deer!  The trail was more technical than the one I took on the "out" and I decided it would be wise to turn around and just go back the way I came.  I ended up with about 8 miles and loved being out on the trails! 

I took the pace very easy but know tomorrow will be rough.  Last week I pulled my right hamstring stretching and it flared up again Thursday; I hoped two nights of deep tissue massage (love my hubby) would cure it but today proved it's not getting better.