Location from Steel Ball Run by Hirohiko Araki
The vast, empty American heartland — where the race spreads out, alliances are tested by isolation, and the sheer scale of the continent becomes the enemy.
The Midwest stages of the Steel Ball Run are where the race becomes an endurance test against the land itself. There are no cities for hundreds of miles. Water sources are scarce and contested. The flatness means you can see threats coming for hours and do nothing about them. Racers who bunched up in the mountain stages spread out here, alone with their horses and whatever's hunting them. This is where many of the race's key battles occur — the emptiness provides privacy for Stand fights that would cause panic in populated areas. Ringo Roadagain's checkpoint is out here. Valentine's agents ambush isolated racers. The Devil's Palms drift through the grassland, invisible until you're inside one. The Midwest is also where Johnny and Gyro's partnership deepens. Days of riding together through nothing build the kind of trust that no single dramatic event could create. The pizza songs happen here. The Spin lessons happen here. The friendship happens here.
Endless grassland stretching to every horizon, broken occasionally by river crossings, isolated farmsteads, and small frontier towns. The sky dominates — enormous, shifting, capable of producing thunderstorms that appear from nowhere and flash floods that rearrange the terrain. The grass moves in waves like a green ocean. At night, the darkness is absolute and the stars are oppressive in their clarity. It is beautiful in the way that anything trying to kill you through sheer indifference is beautiful.
Also known as: The Great Plains, The Prairie, The Heartland