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Tuesday, June 12, 2007
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Role reversal Kandi Hanson knew what it was like to hit a deer; now she knows about getting hit by one By COREY HERMANSON Sports Intern Kandi Hanson has a history of terrorizing deer.
She totaled her first car, a two-door Volkswagen Golf, and damaged two others hitting our white-tailed friends.
Unbeknownst to the other 326 participants, vengeance was abounded at Saturday's Sour Grapes Half and Half at the Northland Arboretum. As Hanson approached the halfway mark of the 10-kilometer race with two friends running by her side, the deer struck back.
Hanson is one of a select few runners across the country who can officially say she has been hit by a deer while running.
Darting out of the woods from the right side of the trail with little warning, a noticeably spooked deer crashed into Hanson, launching the 28-year-old into the air and sending her sprawling onto the grass beside the arboretum trail before disappearing into the woods.
"There were two deer and the first one literally flew by right in front of us and brushed us," said Hanson.
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Kandi Hanson, Sour Grapes Half and Half participant, was hit by a deer Saturday while running in the 10-kilometer race at the Northland Arboretum. Hanson suffered only scrapes and bruises. Brainerd Dispatch/Steve Kohls
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Hanson and two friends, Lottie Oehrlein and Robin Warden, shrieked at their encounter with the first deer before cautiously continuing their run, oblivious of the second deer hurtling toward them.
"We started running a little bit again and Lottie yelled out, 'Here comes another one' and I couldn't get out of the way fast enough. It plowed into me."
Covering her head with her arms and trying to duck out of the way, the second deer took no prisoners, bypassing the other two women and making direct contact with the Pequot Lakes sixth-grade teacher's rib cage.
"Somehow I flew, I don't know how because I shut my eyes," said Hanson, who has been running since she was in ninth grade.
Like most people, when confronted with the bizarre reality that a deer just smashed into her while on foot, Hanson didn't know how to react.
"I was very surprised, my eyes were huge, I was part crying part laughing, I didn't know what to do," she said.
Like a true running warrior, Hanson spit the dirt out of her mouth, brushed herself off and finished the race.
The most common ailments for runners include runner's knee, tendinitis, cramps, shinsplints and dehydration. As a result, Sour Grapes director Jeanne Larson was admittedly unprepared for a runner-deer collision.
"When I heard that a runner got hit by a deer, I said, 'WHAT!'" said Larson. "We didn't have a plan B for when someone gets hit by a deer. When I'm running I consider myself lucky to even see a deer. Getting hit by a deer while running I don't consider so lucky."
Hanson's sister, Kara Brick, was about a mile ahead of Kandi and saw the deer sprinting through the woods.
"They were going flat out full bore, I had a gut feeling someone was going to be hit," said Brick. "Then I got to the end of the race and found out who was hit. Of all the people, of course it had to be Kandi, she's so goofy to begin with."
Although she finished in 31st place, the middle school teacher didn't come away empty-handed. Hanson received a first-place plaque for "being airborne the longest."
Fortunately, what could have ended with serious injuries ended only with minor scrapes and bruises, soreness, lots of smiles and laughter, and one very confused deer.
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