DEADWOOD - The Deadwood-Mickelson Trail Marathon hosted runners from around the country on a beautiful Sunday morning as South Dakota runners won the men's half-marathon, women's marathon and team relay events.

"This is a beautiful course," 2007 women's marathon winner Lisa Fligge, who ran in the Fargo Marathon just two weeks ago, said. "You just can't beat the scenery."

Fligge, from Sioux Falls, finished the 26.2-mile course in 3 hours, 31 minutes and 32 seconds for her second win in the event. She also won in 2003.

Pierre's Brandon Moen won the half-marathon in a time of 1:08:37, which he felt was pretty good considering the muddy conditions in spots.

"I was pretty happy, a 1:08 is pretty good,"Moen said. "The course was a little slow in spots because of the mud, but overall this is just a great event. The organization and everything makes it really nice."

Moen, a 23-year-old who remodels houses in Pierre, is hoping to keep ramping up his training in the hopes of getting an invite to the U.S. Olympic marathon trials for 2012.

"I'm trying to work my way up to that,"he said. "You've got to be patient, I guess. I'm on the trail."

Balantine, Mont., runner Sarah Graves won the women's half-marathon in a time of 1:24:26.

The Cheyenne River Runners, consisting of Tyrone White, Tyson White, Wally Little Moon, Robin Iron Shield and Kiko Mendoza won the team relay event in a time of 2:47:02. Some of the group also ran together last year and they plan on getting together for another go next summer.

"We might kind of make this a tradition,"Tyrone White, a former track and cross country standout at Cheyenne-Eagle Butte, said. "It's pretty fun."

The top relay team still finished seven minutes behind the men's marathon winner, Tim Sykes, who finished the course in 2:40:02.

Sykes, who teaches physical education during the school year at the Virginia Military Institute, has the summer off and decided to hit up the marathon this summer.

"I've never been to the Black Hills before so I figured it would be a good time to come and run my first trail marathon,"Sykes said. "It's just a beautiful area and the course was a lot of fun. It was a great day and a great course. I think trail marathons might be in my future."

Sykes echoed the sentiments of many other runners at the end of his race.

"This is just a great race,"he said. "Mr. (Jerry) Dunn (the race coordinator) did a great job and really has all his ducks in a row. The day was beautiful, everything was great, except I didn't really think the altitude, coming up to 6,000 feet from sea level, would be as big of a deal as it was heading up (the first half of the race). I was a little more taxed cardiovascularly than I thought I would be."

The field's youngest runner, 7-year-old Mackenna Peart from Amarillo, Tex., did a little taxing of her own, running a half-marathon in a little over three hours -3:18:23.

"I wanted to finish first in my age group,"Peart, who was the field's youngest entrant by four years, said. She didn't quite do that -all runners 17 and under were in one age group, but no runner elicited more slack-jawed stares at the finish line.

"I think I'll probably come back again next year," said Peart, who estimated the farthest she's ever run to be "about 40 minutes."

"I might have to walk on my hands for the next six weeks, though."

For photos from Sunday's marathon, click here.