DreamBig 2015 - #46 South Dakota

STATE #46 - Hill City, South Dakota
Run Crazy Horse
Finishers: 627

October 2, 2015
Just an average day in the life of Ashley Ahner. Although I was finally recovering from Bali jet lag and my Massachusetts race that I ran 5 days ago, I was yet again off on an other half marathon adventure. My flight wasn't until 7PM so I actually went into work all day and then took Marta down to the airport from the office around 4:30PM to meet up with Kyle. Kyle is one of my friends who I think just got sick of hearing and reading about all of my adventures and finally just said, "Guess what? I'm coming with you to South Dakota."

One issue that we already encountered before we left Atlanta was that since South Dakota doesn't have ChickFilA, I wouldn't be able to have my "day before the race traditional breakfast". To solve that, we bought 2 chicken sandwiches with cheese and prayed we could find a bagel and eggs in South Dakota to make my own chicken egg and cheese bagel. Problem #1 solved.

Rations - Always Prepared

Flying out of ATL

Even though the ATL airport was crazy, we had no issue getting to our flight on time and up to Minneapolis where we were scheduled for a 45 minute layover before continuing on to Rapid City. I was a diva and ditched Kyle on the flight when I was upgraded to first class for the next flight. I fell asleep pretty quick into the flight and only awoke to an announcement saying:

"Well folks, looks like we are having an issue with Mother Nature here in Rapid City. We've arrived but the cloud ceiling is so low that unless it lifts in the next 30 minutes, we are going to have to return back to Minneapolis"

Say what? You are going to fly me back? It was one of those times where you were stressed out but you were sure we would end up landing.....we didn't end up landing. We flew back to Minneapolis in a blur and deplaned around 1:20AM where we were told that because the delay was due to weather, we wouldn't be compensated in any way for hotels but that floor pads were available down by Mickey Mouse and our flight would leave again at 7:00AM. We debated getting a hotel but scrapped that idea and just opted to have a sleepover party with the rest of our flight mates on the floor of the Minneapolis airport. Kyle and I basically put on all of the sweats we had both brought on the trip and did our best to catch some z's on our kindergarten tumbling mats.

Sleeping....

....on the airport.....

....floor

October 3, 2015
I think we both woke up surprised that we got a little bit of sleep around 5:30AM - why 5:30 you ask? Because the MSP airport had a ChickFilA! We both changed and packed up our sleeping areas and rushed down to get some food before our flight. A little disappointed, the MSP ChickFilA only had chicken biscuits...no eggs, no bagels. Brilliant Kyle suggested I hop down to Einsteins and get a egg and cheese bagel and then get a chicken and build my own sandwich. Problem solved! (I just realized this blog is currently 30% about a sandwich).

Bright eyed and bushy tailed at 5:29AM after MSP Slumber

Constructing the makeshift but necessary chicken, egg and cheese bagel

We got back to our gate with fingers crossed and thankfully made it in to Rapid City by 7:30AM on Saturday. Walking a little zombie like, we went to Avis to get our rental car where the employee asked "Is a Mustang alright for you?" - Say What? No, I think you're confused sir - my rental cars usually resemble small toasters or go karts. I gladly accepted his offer and was a little too excited about our rental car when I met her.

Not bad, Avis

Not bad at all

With no real plan, we headed out on the open road east down I-90. I had heard about Wall Drug which was said to be a tourist trap with a lot of junk, 5 cent coffee and donuts and I pointed the car in that direction to Wall, South Dakota. The landscape on the way was gorgeous - just open rolling plains. It was a bit rainy and chilly but we figured it would blow through.

We got to Wall Drug and did a little souvenir shopping before grabbing some donuts and coffee and playing in the "backyard" on some of the random toys. Then with no agenda, we hopped in the car and headed south towards the the Badlands National Park. I don't know if I have just been guarded from the world, but I honestly didn't know the Badlands existed until a month or so before the race.

Donuts, Coffee and Biscuits and Gravy at Wall Drug

Wall Drug Cafe

Save a horse, ride a ginormous Jackalope

Mother and Child

Outside Wall Drug Store

Headed out on the Oregon Trail - who's with me?

Kyle loves this....and by this I mean supervising my play time

After stopping for a quick snapshot at the park sign, we headed into the Badlands and it was like driving into Land Before Time. We drove over a ridge after just cruising through some fields and BOOM! The most unreal panoramic view of the Badlands. I still can't begin to understand how this formations were made JUST in the Badlands and not anywhere else. Hence why I think the dinosaurs built it.

We made it to the land before time!

Our first look at the Badlands

Dope.

Sorry I have to

We spent the rest of the morning driving the scenic Route 240 through the park to the opposite entrance of the park stopping to take pictures and read signs along the way. We sadly couldn't see as much as we would've liked as the clouds, drizzle and wind put a little damper on our views but we did our best to enjoy what we could see.

At the opposite side of the park, we went into the Cedar Pass Lodge and Gift Shop to grab some lunch of Buffalo Chili and native bread and berry dip. I can't remember what it was called. With no other plans for the day, we decided to drive back the way we came to see if the weather had cleared enough to see anything else. We got to see some prairie dogs and big horn sheep and some more views with less weather issues.

Yellow Mounds - Yellow = where seafloor used to be

Buffalo Chili

Plotting our next adventure

Such Badlands

The norm.

After our second pass of the Badlands, we said our goodbyes and headed towards Hill City, SD to get my race packet at the Boys and Girls Club and then head on to more sites to see! Post packet pickup, we ventured down to Crazy Horse Memorial where once we had driven through the Black Hills and up to the monument, we realized we were in the clouds with no Crazy Horse to be seen. We stuck around the welcome center and watched the 30 minute movie about the monument hoping the clouds would clear....with no luck. Defeated, we head to the hotel to check in.

Packet PickUp

Ah! Crazy Horse Motto - Love it!

No monument - just welcome center 

Street for Memorial - Funny I'd be running this on Chiefs Gameday!

The hotel was the Lodge at Palmer Gulch which was en route to Mt. Rushmore. We checked in around 5:15PM and took a quick break from running around and watched some football. Around 6PM, we head downtown to grab some dinner at the Hill City Cafe where we met the chef and chatted with him about his past and his delicious, ginormous, Chicken Fried Steak. It was super small town eating but the people were so great and welcoming.

Pre race meal - they just keep getting better

Ashley v. Kyle

Lights on ground when you unlock the Mustang at night!

Defeated from Crazy Horse, we decided to go try our luck at the night time viewing of Mt. Rushmore. We drove up in the mist and were greeted with a gorgeous view of spotlight on clouds...and that's about it. Strike two, American Monuments. We hit up the gift shop and head home. It was like a 6 mile drive back to the hotel and I fell asleep probably like a mile into the drive - I was exhausted. I usually prep all of my race stuff the night before but barely got my contacts out before crawling into bed. I was easily asleep by 9PM. Good night cloudy, South Dakota.


October 4, 2015
Race Day! I woke up around 5:30am and Kyle was lucky enough to get to see the wreck of a human I am pacing back and forth in the room trying to remember everything and forgetting everything I just did. Fun for him, miserable for me. Luckily, as the host hotel, I was picked up on a bus from the hotel around 7am to take us up to Crazy Horse which was the beginning of the race. As I was waiting on the bus, a man came on and a lady announced that he was running his 50th Marathon state today. A group of girls in front of me started chatting about how cool it would be to run in every state and how long that would take, etc. and me being me interjected into a conversation where I was invited and told them that this was my 46th state. They were shocked because the man who was doing his 50th was like 70 years old and I am not even 30 yet. They had a ton of questions to ask about the travel and cost and training and I just loved being interviewed - I can talk about this stuff all day (hence why I have a very rambling blog).

Bus...sitting alone...quietly

We got up to Crazy Horse around 7:20am and it was still too cloudy to see the monument - what the heck South Dakota. At this point I was starting to believe that both Mt. Rushmore and Crazy Horse are conspiracies and they don't actually exist. (This conspiracy goes along with the same thought that I sometimes think my life is a parallel of the Truman Show....I spend too much time alone if you can't tell).

It was chilly but the welcome center was open so everyone huddled inside and warmed up while we waited. Around 7:55am, we all head outside where their was a Native American drummer who sang us a song and then told us at the start of the second song the race would start - a nice change from a gun or a countdown!

Inside Welcome Center Pre-Race 

Stretching and snackin'

Drum to start the race

The race started with a little downhill and then a big uphill - this is when I first realized the altitude difference of Georgia versus South Dakota. Hill City, SD sat at about 5,200 feet but I only realized it on the uphill when I was having a harder time getting air in and burning in my throat. With the hilly start, the first mile went rather slow but I forced myself to remember my last race was only 7 days ago so I just needed to enjoy this.

As we looped around back up to the visitors center and down the service road towards Crazy Horse, the clouds broke just enough for me to see Crazy Horse! Not going to lie, I legit stopped and pulled over to take a photo. With our luck so far on the trip, I wasn't passing up a chance to see the monument. The course continued to climb to Mile 2 and took hostage a lot of runners turning them to walkers, but I continued to chug along. With one more hill heading out of the park (the same hill we started on), I continued my chug along knowing the rest of the course would be a gradual downhill back into town.

I FOUND IT!

LOOK!

It's A CRAZY HORSE!

Only.... 11 more miles

Motto on course after Mile 2 

We jumped on the Mickelson Trail around Mile 3 and continued north to Hill City. The path was finely packed gravel which was a nice break for the legs. I didn't know how my knee would react to the gradual downhill so I decided to wear the brace which tends to slow me down but not enough for it to make a difference - I was in a slow mood.

Mile 3 to 4 was marked wrong because I saw both mile markers within the same Miley Cyrus song. The Mickelson trail is straight up gorgeous. Yellow aspen trees, little babbling brooks, and just nature all around. Not to mention a nice little downhill gradient giving you time to just enjoy and not have to focus on the ups and downs.

PHONE DIED! USE YOUR IMAGINATION aka my Google pics!

I was taking a Snapchat of the gorgeous scenery around Mile 4 and my phone that had been at 79% just drops to 1% and dies. DIES! How will I take pictures of these pretty leaves?!?! Pouting with no solution, I turn my attention to the task at hand of running the race. I started chatting with a random guy around Mile 4 who told me he started running to make a healthy change in his life after being a drug and alcohol addict through his younger years but he had been sober for 11 years. He said his friends joke with him for doing all of these races, but he said they are the weird ones for not understanding why his friends wouldn't want to run 13.1 miles with 3,000 women dressed in spandex. Dude made me laugh. Perfect example of what I always say about running - how everyone has a story. And how whenever I am sucking in a race, I just remember that everyone around me is running for a purpose, or a goal, or a dream. I may only hear .01% of those stories but it helps to hear some of the stories as a reminder of why I continue to work to accomplish my own goal.

Stole these photos of the trail from Google

                                     
                                        

                 
So moving along, by Mile 6 me and the bro had split up and I overheard him ask some ladies what pace they were going to which they replied 10 and a half minute pace. Say what? I know I can go a little faster than that, so with the downhill in my favor I took the next 2 miles by storm and played the game seeing how many people I could pass in the next 2 miles. At Mile 8 I had to make a pit stop at the porta-potty and as quick as I was, I had lost a lot of ground on my passing people game by the time I got back on the course.

I continued over the river and through the woods, to Hill City Downtown I go. We passed over a lot of bridges and by farms and I just continued to count down the songs/mile. The water stops all had bananas, oranges, bagels, pretzels and M&M's but for once in my life I just wasn't feeling food. And I had been wearing gloves the entire race and just didn't feel like having orange juice gloves.

The miles continued to tick on and I was getting restless. The ladies running the 10.5 min/mile easily cruised by and I asked if they had picked up the pace. Nope...I had slowed down. Whoopsie. A man and his son who I assumed lived in town kept reappearing along the course with funny signs like "Go Random Stranger" and "Worst Parade Ever - Where's All the Candy" and "You've done smarter things when you were drunk". Gotta love town participation.

At Mile 12, we were almost there but up ahead I saw a bunch of horses at the fence right on the trail. I couldn't pass by them so I stopped and without thinking of my chances of getting bit, I pet the one horse on its nose and then another horse ran over and I pet that one as well. People passing me seemed a bit confused but I'm sorry, we don't have horses on the streets of Atlanta - let me enjoy my moment.

Here's what a horse looks like

                                               
With a mile left to go, I could see the stop lights of town up ahead. We got off the trail and took a quick up hill and then turned right down Main Street where you could see the finish down below. Since it was still a downhill grade, I had to make myself remember even though I could see the finish I was still .3 of a mile away and couldn't kick yet. I saw the 26 mile mark and picked up the pace with .2 to go. By .15 mile I was in a full out Kirkwood Cross Country High School Ashley Ahner Finish Sprint with the crowd at the finish line all cheering "nice kick!"- "Strong Finish" - "Get the next one!" as I continued to pick off the runners ahead of me little by little. I won't lie - I've got a good finish when I'm not just whooped - which means I probably could have tried a little harder during the race. Oh well - at least I entertained at the finish line.

Only like .5 miles of the race were on a road so this must be near the end

Ignore my time....I never said I was fast

Since my phone was dead I had zero way of finding Kyle and we hadn't come up with a plan. I wandered to the outside of the finishers chute with my new medal looking high and low for the kid. I said congrats to the friends I had made on the course and then continued to wander like a lost bird. After contemplating just sitting down in the street, I finally found him and he took my photo and we head back to the hotel because I was freezing.

One Photo Downtown

OFFICIAL RACE PIC - 46 states down, 4 to go! #DREAMBIG

We caught the first half of the Chiefs game and then tried for Round 2 at Mt. Rushmore to which we were greeted with even thicker fog and some rain. Dag Nabbit. We sat at the cafe and ate some Buffalo Stew and some Moose Drool beer (Gregg and I's favorite from our Missoula trip) and tried to wait out the weather. We even walked the trail that goes right up under the monument and couldn't see anything but rocks. Sad to give up, we decided to use our last bit of time exploring Custer Park which was known for lots of wildlife.

Love this beer! 

The conspiracy called "Mt. Rushmore"

Washington...still a myth

Flags are barely even here

Mt. Rushmore....was here?

We drove down to the park and could tell the drive would be incredible if not for the fog, but we enjoyed what we could see. We did see a deer but nothing too crazy. We kept thinking we saw things but when we got closer they were all usually piles of branches and leaves. We had all but lost hope when we drove up on another stick pile that was a BUFFALO! These things are huge and was no more than 20-30 feet from the car. It was awesome - they have HUGE heads. Content with our nature accomplishment, we head into the town of Custer for a treat at the Purple Pie Place for some Blackberry and Strawberry Rhubarb Pie - so yum.

Custer Park

BUFFALO!!!!

My big head and the buffalo

Purple Pie Place

Strawberry Rhubarb and Blackberry Ala Mode - not both mine

With not much time to spare, we drove the last hour back to the airport where we departed around 7pm for Salt Lake City and took a red eye home at 12:55am back to Atlanta and straight into work via Marta for me Monday morning.

All in all a great tip despite the weather - I highly recommend this race and this part of the country! Top of my favorites list for sure - even with the fog!



46 states down, 4 more to go!
#DREAMBIG