On Saturday 16th January 2016, April Hamlin, who lived near Elkmont, Alabama, let her two-and-a-half-year-old Bloodhound called Ludivine out on their farm.
Ludivine was often freely wandering around the woods and neighbourhood, so everything felt the same as any other day.
But a quarter of a mile away, people were gathering for the town’s first half-marathon, a 13.1-mile event organised to raise money for the local school’s athletics programmes.
Ludivine, apparently attracted by all the activity, wandered into town and began mingling with the crowds.
Nobody seemed particularly concerned about her. She had a collar on, so people assumed she was with someone nearby.
Then the race began, the runners set off, and Ludivine decided to join them, running the race with them.
At around the two-mile mark, she stopped to investigate a dead rabbit. And at other stages, wandered off into gardens, explored streams, investigated fields containing cows and mules, and stopped to greet other dogs.
One competitor, Jim Clemens, recalled how she repeatedly disappeared on her adventures, but kept catching up with them and racing past again.
Eventually, after covering the entire 13.1-mile course, Ludivine crossed the finishing line in a remarkable time of 1 hour, 32 minutes and 56 seconds, in 7th place, amongst 165 official entrants, despite her many distractions.
The organisers were so delighted they presented her with a finisher’s medal and took photographs of the unexpected participant.
It was only when friends began sending photographs to her owner’s phone that she learned her dog had entered the race by herself and received a medal.
Initially, she was embarrassed, worried that her wandering dog might have disrupted the race.
But far from being annoyed, the organisers and runners were delighted.
Photographs of Ludivine wearing her medal spread around the world, and the previously little-known event attracted international publicity.
The story became so popular that the organisers renamed the event Elkmont’s Hound Dog Half Marathon in her honour.
According to April, she usually described Ludivine as a rather lazy dog.
