Scariest Bike Ride EVER

Is it just me, or when random things happen in your life, do some of them get you saying, “If I was ready for THAT, I’m ready for Ironman?” I’ve been thinking like that a lot lately, and I had one of those moments last night.

The plan was to do a swim/bike brick. I took my bike to the Highland pool and planned to practice transition out of my trunk. I swam 3200 meters at a decent pace, ran out to my car, grabbed my stuff, hopped on my bike, and headed out for a 40 mile ride on the Gateway Trail. My legs were heavy and I wasn’t going too fast. I was going against the wind on the way out, and I was riding about 16-17 mph. Nothing fancy.

Then I came across 2 women walking a huge German Shepard. Yep, this story is about to take a turn for the worse. The 2 women had their backs to me and were taking up most of the trail, so I gave a friendly “on your left” as I was coming up behind them. They scooted over. As I passed them, the German Shepard reared up like a bucking bronco. He was on a short leash, and the woman in control was holding him back with all her might. I must have startled him. Or he thought I was a deer - a perfect lunch. It was quite a large animal when it was standing on its back legs!

I got past the hyper German Shepard only to have my heart sink when I heard these words come from behind me: “Riley, NO! RILEY...RILEY, NO!!!

Shit.

A second later, I hear the sound of the German Shepard’s claws on the trail getting louder and louder. It’s not a pleasant sound. He came up on my right. (So I’m thinking, what an impolite dog - don't you know you’re supposed to pass on the left? I’m such a bike nerd.) He’s staring at me the whole time. He’s bounding with giant leaps. He’s not barking or growling, but he is making these deep, rumbling noises. He gets ahead me, still looking over his shoulder at me. He cuts in front of me and cocks his head back around to look over his right shoulder. I crouch down and lay into my bike - I hunker down in my drop down bars. “I’m getting out of here,” I think. I start pulling away.

The German Shepard now realizes that I’m an admirable foe, and he kicks into high gear as well. He comes up again on my right. We’re staring at each other - I’m looking just over my right shoulder at him. Then he makes his move.

He lunges at me. Full throttle. I can still see it happening in slow motion. In real time, I felt like it was happening in slow motion. His front paws are spread wide apart, ready to take me down. We were about to meet face-to-face, or should I say teeth-to-neck. I did the only thing I could think of: I took my right hand, kept my palm open, stretched my fingers back, and nailed the heel of my palm right in the dog’s face. The blow landed with a CRACK right between the dog’s eye and corner of his mouth. (Now, before I get any nasty comments, I LOVE animals. I have 2 cats, and I grew up with a total of 5 dogs. I’ve never hit an animal like this before. I only struck this dog because it was about to kill me. I hope you understand.)

I didn’t break anything, and the dog didn’t break anything, but the shot was loud. I swerved out of control to the left from the power of the punch. I didn’t wipe out. Holy crap, how did I NOT wipe out?!? I didn’t look back. I never looked back. I dropped into aero and gave it everything. If I still had hair on my body, it all would have been standing on end. I looked down. My bike computer said 33 mph. This was on the flat, against the wind. I had been pulling 16-17 mph just a minute before. I took a moment to give myself a little half-cocked smile indicating how proud I was of that speed, and then I got serious again.

A moment later, I realized that I had a long scratch on my right arm. No blood, just a long red mark. That was all I was left with from this encounter.

Immediately, I wanted to bottle this feeling that I had. All of these endorphins, adrenaline, and everything else that was coursing through me - I wanted to keep it. I wanted to remember it and use it on those 112 miles on the bike on September 9th. But after a few miles, the feeling was gone. All I have left is the visual of the leaping dog coming at me. Maybe that visual can be my secret weapon on the bike...