Sioux Falls Lincoln’s Ali Bainbridge is the 2022-23 Gatorade South Dakota girls cross-country runner of the year. 

Bainbridge is the first Gatorade South Dakota girls cross-country runner of the year to be chosen from Lincoln High School. 

The award, which recognizes not only outstanding athletic excellence, but also high standards of academic achievement and exemplary character demonstrated on and off the field, distinguishes Bainbridge as South Dakota’s best high school girls cross country player. 

Also the state’s 2019-20 Gatorade Player of the Year as a student at Lennox High, the 5-foot-3 senior raced to the Class AA individual state championship this past season with a time of 17:26.09, leading the Patriots to third place as a team. Bainbridge also won the Nike Heartland Preview, the Augustana Twilight Meet and the Clyde Cotton Invitational in addition to finishing fourth in the Gold Race at the prestigious Roy Griak Invitational. She took sixth at the Nike Heartland Regional Championships and missed becoming an All-American at Nike Cross Nationals by one place, finishing three seconds behind the final honoree. 

A member of the National Honor Society as well as the school’s Spanish Club, Latin Club and Patriot Pride Committee, Bainbridge has served as part of the student council and as a teacher’s assistant in her religion class. She has also volunteered locally on behalf of Feeding South Dakota, the Serve and Learn Student Association and Best Buddies, a program that creates opportunities for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. She is a member of her church youth group as well and donates her time to the church’s nursery caregiving program.

Bainbridge has maintained a 3.97 weighted GPA in the classroom. She has signed a National Letter of Intent to run on scholarship at the University of Nebraska this fall.